Shiver
by Mistress Infy
Summary: Erik is cold and half-sick of shadows... Will he find his warmth again? Originally posted on a particular Phantom forum. Some adult situations in later chapters.
1. Chapter 1

I shiver.

I am certain that it is not from the winter chill that seems more bitter every year, nor the harsh winds that blow through the empty hollowness of my home. No, it is something worse. Something has torn me apart, and I am cold. So I shiver.

Oh, but for a time, I was warm. For a brief moment I knew what happiness was, just for a season. I found comfort in her chrysalline eyes. Surely I loved her.

It is possible that love is not meant for monsters, and if that is true, then I am damned to a hell of the most miserable kind. I knew paradise, I held it within my hand, within my poor, dreadful hands, and I gave it up, turned her away. She left me alone with the cold despair of loneliness.  
I shiver. Alone, in the dark, I shiver.

My angel, my life, my only love was carried away by a mere mortal. But, of course, it is to be expected that an angel would prefer to spend her days with a man, a whole man even, instead of a demon. Such creatures are not deserving of angels. Ah, but Fate has lent me a second chance, perhaps as recourse for this cursed face of mine. I have found her, my angel. My warmth. God, how I needed her. How I need her still. She will know me again, soon, and I shall bask in the sunshine of her smile. I will keep her locked inside my heart, and she will be my light.

The cold wind howls through this dismal cavern, but I cannot feel its chill when I permit my mind to wander to her. I can still see her fair curls, her ivory skin. I can hear her voice, her angel's voice. I can taste her tears. I would love to hear no other sound but to hear her say my name one last time.

I have already planned how I will take her hands, her dear, sweet hands, and I will hold them within my own as I beg her to once again allow me to love her, and maybe, just maybe she will love me in return. If that does not work, I will fall to my knees, and I will beg and plead before her like a dog. But she will love me, oh how she will love me...She must.

I have grown weary of this frozen place, the ghosts that are really more of spirit than I am. I will put my cape around my shameful body, and I will cover my Death's face one more time. I will go to my angel, without her poor boy there to save her, without my dear Daroga to remind me that I am a monster, and she, an angel; and she will love me. She will. I will make her. We will be warm and we will wallow in the flame of our love forever more.

But for now, I shiver.


	2. Chapter 2

This foul place that I have called a home for the past few years is no longer the home I knew. Gone are the draperies, the beautiful sculptures, even my paintings. Gone are my masterpieces. The brutes took everything, seemingly even my very soul. But it was necessary, vital, to the deception that was to follow in order for my dear Christine and her Viscount to think me dead. The irony of it, to think that they believe me to be a real ghost now. It is laughable.

Yet I feel a strange sense of pride. I alone brought Paris to it's knees in a singular movement; I alone stopped the presumptious socialites and their banalities from further pervading these halls. "Rebuild," they all say. But no matter how many times they wash the marble floors, or how many tapestries and seats they replace, the acrid smell of smoke will still hang in the air. No matter what opera or ballet they choose to grace the stage with, they will all still hear the screams of those trapped under the chandelier. Never will they forget the haunting sounds of the singular performance of Don Juan Triumphant; it will forever be ringing in their ears. It is, of course, a source of immense pride for me.

I surveyed the dusty remains of my once fabulous home, and felt my lip curl in distaste. The fools. They hadn't left a thing of value, not even my music. It had been burned, along with my paintings in a ritual that brought them only satisfaction, but not solace, because they didn't find hide nor hair of me. No matter. I wouldn't be spending much time here anyway.

I bent over, touching a corner of music that was charred and twisted. My life's work, the music that I held dear was destroyed. It didn't matter now.

I had found Christine. I knew where she was all the time, of course, she and her viscount. They were hidden away in a small, northern town where no one knew who they were. Yes, it would be a grand reunion.

I stood, and pulled my cape around my shoulders, and pressed my mask to my face, and looked around my home for the last time, and could still hear the music echoing around. I sighed, and then I fled into the Paris night.

**AN:** I feel like I should clarify a few things--probably should've one this in the first post, oops. This is mostly going to be Leroux-based, with touches of ALW, simply because I felt that he did a good job of granting Erik a voice. NO movie Phantom here. If any of you dare to picture Gerik, I'm coming after you. I also realize that these chapters are short--I promise they get longer, as when I finished this, I was out of school. Cookies and kisses for anyone who reviews!


	3. Chapter 3

I ran from the Opera, from the memories it held. Ironic, isn't it? To escape my own demons, I must become one, I must be someone else's nightmare. I also ran because my horse had been stolen from me in the pillaging of my home that followed the fire. No matter, I could get a new one soon enough.

A vagabond looked up at me with hungry eyes as I turned down a desolate alley way that was strewn with refuse both new and old. I stared back at the filthy man, a challenge, a confirmation that I was indeed the famed Opera Ghost. I half expected him to open his decaying mouth, but he said nothing, just shrank back a little. Good. The people were still afraid of me. It would serve me better in the months to come.

I stopped short at the sound of voices, then upon further consideration, turned out onto the main road. Such an excersion was a bold move for me. The streets of Paris had never been kind to me; but one must make sacrifices for love, mustn't we?

My legs started to burn from the unaccustomed exercise, and I longed for a horse. Since all had fled the undergrounds of the Opera, I had no need to run from the curious stares, and leap into the shadows to save myself. I had grown lazy, and overly-confident. Perhaps I had a right to be. Was I not the damned Opera Ghost?

"Yes, and quite a ghost you are," I murmured to the dark night. "Not even able to keep your grasp on a horse."

It wasn't all misery, though. It had been so long since I had seen the stars, as I did not dare venture outside The Opera. They looked like a thousand diamonds littering the sky. It reminded me of the beautiful things Christine loved to wear in her hair.

"Oh, Christine." The words slipped out of my mouth, freezing in the air before me. No. I couldn't have any weakness this time. Oh, but how I missed her. How I missed her playful smile and her dancer's legs. How I missed her angel's voice and her child's laugh. I allowed myself the luxury of a sigh before pressing on. My love awaited me at the end of a long journey, and I shouldn't keep her waiting any longer.

I picked up my feet and started moving again, hoping to find a place to hide before daybreak. With the dawn would come the masses, and any hope of finding a place to spend the day would vanish.

A chance glance down at my running feet spied old newspapers in the gutter. A cruel smile twisted my already maimed features as I recalled a familiar headline that I had cut out, and saved, no, worshipped, from a newspaper that had blown close enough for me to grab from behind the gate that led to the road.

"Viscount Lost at Sea; Family Mourns"

It had also been accompanied by a lovely daguerreotype of Christine's beautiful face twisted in grief. Ah, but the sight was beautiful. The justice of it, for her to finally feel the despair of losing one's love. It still makes me smile.


	4. Chapter 4

The first streaks of dawn were littering the sky before I found a suitable place to spend the day. Brilliant oranges and pinks danced across my mask as I gazed up at the towers that reached to the sky. Yes, this small cathedral would provide ample sanctuary, at least for the time being. I didn't know which one it was, nor if it even had a name. I didn't care, either, because unlike my beloved, I had never had any affections for any sort of pious rituals.

Footsteps resounded off the stone walls of the buildings around me, and I was reminded that soon the streets would be crowded. The west portal served as a relatively obscure entrance, away from prying eyes. I stood for a minute and allowed my eyes to adjust to the semi-darkness and brushed the light dusting of snow from my shoulders.

I craned my neck up, taking in the exquisite rib vaulting and rosettes. The stained glass windows cast long, beautiful colors across the tiled floor, and I found myself appreciating the brilliant architecture in contrast to the drab exterior. From the outside, it was menacing, fearful, with its spires and iron fencing, gothic features. But here, inside... Surely heaven must look something like this. Warm, candlelight, bold, luminescent colors falling across the ground, making it look as though one is constantly walking through jewels.

More irony. Perhaps the reason I was so drawn to this truly delightful building was that it mirrored my own station in life: So often misjudged by its exterior, frightening as it may be, but wondrous and full of beautiful things and good intentions.

Perhaps I would make a good cathedral, when I am dead. Yes, and the maggots and worms will come to Mass everyday, punctually at dawn, of course, and they will consume my long-dead flesh. _But do the dead really die?_ I pondered while I wandered aimlessly through the open space in front of the altar.

Clearly, I'm quite insane.

But I am not insane merely for the sake of being insane; no, I am insane because I am in love! Surely all lovers are quite mad! Yes, yes, with all their talk of poems and flowers, they are clearly not fully thinking. It is my station, nay, my duty to be insane! I'm the damned Phantom of the Opera! Nobody wants a sane madman, do they? Heavens, no! I am Don Juan!

"I _am _Don Juan!" I said suddenly, my voice echoing around me. I listened for a moment, me ears straining to be sure that my voice was perfectly pitched, not the least bit flat, no, not even when I speak. "Yes! I am Don Juan Triumphant! Any woman who sees my face is _forever mine_!" The acoustics of this loud space were quite remarkable, and I stood for a moment, and relished the sound of my own voice.

"Father?"

I cursed myself suddenly for forgetting that I was not the only person that would be seeking sanctuary in this place. I cut my eyes around, searching for a way to escape the chapel, and spied a heavy wooden door to my left. I ran for it, pulled on the handle, it wouldn't budge, turned the handle a bit more, there it's moving! I slammed it shut behind me just as someone opened the door that I had come into the cathedral through. I stood on the very tips of my feet, and peered through the small window in the door. A young boy, very curious, no doubt, peered through. Perhaps part of the Choir? It didn't matter.

"Father? Is that you?" he called again. My heart started pounding harder as he took cautious steps toward the very door that I was hiding behind. My poor old heart, nearly stopped as his hand reached up for the handle, and I gritted my teeth in anticipation of the blood shed that would no doubt ensue. He would scream, and I would be forced to break his little neck. I really didn't want to have to kill someone so early in my journey, not really, but if I needed to kill this boy, even in this sacred place, so be it.

"I'm here, Jean, in the rectory. You are late!" a voice called from somewhere behind the altar, through a set of doors. The boy hurried through and a door slammed shut.

I released a breath I didn't know I'd been holding, and looked about as I tried to regain my senses. Stairs spiraled up behind me, and I started climbing. They no doubt led to the bell tower, and that seemed as suitable space as any to wait for nightfall.

I was panting like a dog left in the heat by the time I came to the tower--the air was stale and stagnant. It wasn't especially high, but alas, I am not as young as I would have liked to have been, and the moldy smell was bothersome. The climb, however, was undoubtedly worth the effort, as the view that spread out before my eyes was something grand to behold.

The sun was just peeking over the horizon, casting brilliant oranges and yellows on the buildings and streets below. It had been so long before I had seen Paris, this beautiful city, by daylight. I was once again struck by its elegance, much as I had been when I first arrived at this city of paradoxes. It moved me, strangely enough, and I wished that I had my organ, even my violin, to capture the essence of the moment. Oh, but for a pen and some paper to write but a few notes on! I would have to be content with the sound of my own voice, humming quietly. Not a requiem, this time, but a dirge, for the heartbreak of such a beautiful thing as a sunrise being wasted on me.

_But isn't what all your music is?_ some cynical part of my inner-consciousness asked. _Isn't it all a dirge, a requiem, a ballad for something as wondrous as an angel being wasted on you?_

I had no answer.

A cold wind blasted through all at once, halting my mournful song, and I huddled low on the floor. I cursed the wind, then myself for letting it bother me. Don Juan does not feel the cold! I shivered.

_Some Don Juan_, my inner-demons laughed.

Christine was never cold. Her skin was always warm, fairly emanating heat from it. Surely she could warm my frozen skin, if not my heart. Yes, her warm hands, her soft body melting into mine... Surely that would warm me. Such a delicious thought. I shivered again, but this time not from the cold.

_You are not worthy!_

I shivered.

_You are not worthy..._


	5. Chapter 5

_She is _here_._

_  
She is before me, around me, behind me... She is everywhere! She is coming to me, prancing to me, arms outstretched and eyes shining. She is not the grieving woman that I had seen on the front of the newspaper; no, she is quite joyful, glowing, even, and she is smiling, smiling for me. She is filled with joy, and tenderness, and she is pressing her body to me, oh, God, her soft body, and her lips, she is lifting her lips and--_

I wake with a start and a jerk, nearly upsetting myself out of the saddle. The great horse beneath me snorts, and dances sideways, massive hooves splashing in the mud. I pull on the reins and tighten my long legs, distracted, not entirely out of my sleep, aware only of a distinct sense of longing.

_Christine_.

I had been dreaming of her. I had inadvertently fallen asleep while still astride my horse, plodding down some forgotten country road. I closed my eyes, and toyed with the notion of weeping, but couldn't bring myself to shed tears for her again.

I allowed myself the luxury of hanging my head for a moment, then drew myself back upright, sitting tall in the saddle. I was, after all, Don Juan, a conquistador, a triumphant warrior. I would ride my noble beast up to her door, and sweep her away. Yes, I would take her, and I knew how to do it. My Christine was a creature of habit, and surely I should know that from spending years watching her, memorizing her every breath. She would still be dedicated to her dearly beloved, still go to him everyday.

My mind, however twisted and cruel, knew the perfect way to capture her, to control her, to make her love me. I could see how it would happen, how I would reclaim my love. Yes, I love the wonderfully devious things that spill from my brain.

The onyx horse beneath me tugged impatiently at the reins, straining forward, anxious to be moving again. I tightened my grip, reaffirming my dominance. There are those that speak of partnerships, of love between man and horse, but that simply could not be the case with this monster of a horse. I had to constantly assert myself, and never let him sense my weakness. Perhaps that had been my mistake with Christine?

Nevermind that. My horse, my noble steed, was the color of the blackest night, with long mane and tail. He was massive, huge, and towered above me on graceful limbs. But I had expected such, had demanded excellence from my horse, and I had chosen a spectacular specimen, snatched him from the stall he had been imprisoned in. He had some sort of ridiculous name plastered on the front of his stall door, "Sir Gallagher", or some such nonesense, and that simply wouldn't do. So I had christened him Exodus, as he was taking me from one life to another.

I inhaled deeply, smelling the night, and focused my eyes on the horizon. Exodus likewise flared his nostrils, and tossed his sculpted head about. A matter of days now, days before I would be before her.

And she would be mine.


	6. Chapter 6

I sat. And I waited.

I sat and I waited until my legs that I crouched upon were numb and my hands were frozen from the cold. I didn't mind. I would wait for an eternity if need be.

I was contemplating the merits of not having much sanity to lose in the first place when I saw a familiar carriage approaching. A clever grin twisted my lips cruelly as I listened to the creak of the wheels upon the cobblestone as it approached my hidden perch. Such satisfaction at finally being able to see the fruits of my hours of waiting and watching and planning--a casual glimpse of Her Majesty the Queen of Fops' carriage, and then a flash of golden curls and skirts before she scurried inside.

I pondered at that for a moment, as to why she never allowed herself time in the sun, but it wasn't really at the forefront of my mind. No, there was much more importance in the way the dying sun cast it's last rays on her fair hair.

I waited for the familiar sound of the doors leading to the great foyer of her stately home to slam shut to reach my straining ears, and then I slid silently from the shadows, taking up a spot behind the shrubbery of the gates that were locked tight every night without fail. I had no fear of discovery--we were so far removed from civilization that it was a wonder anyone would even know where to find her, the Angel.

But I knew. And I watched her, watched her every move, memorized her daily routine. A creature of habit, my Christine. It was not because she was persnickety about the order in which things happened; no, it was more of a desire, a need, really, to have control, organization over something in her life. I found some solace in that, as it would make my planning so much easier. Nothing interfered with her daily regimen, be it rain, sleet, or snow.

I waited for a moment, stared at the second floor window, last on the left, waiting for the familiar orange glow to illuminate the large window as the fire was stoked. A feeling of unexpected bitterness stole through me as the warmth from the window failed to reach me.

Oh, but it didn't matter because suddenly her silhouette was visible, oh, she was sitting in the cushion of the bay window. Her arm, her delicate arm was reaching above her head and...What? She moved in vague, erratic patterns that didn't--ah. Of course. She was brushing her hair, no doubt, as she did every night before she fell into her warm bed. Oh, but just to watch her, just once, as she untangled her locks, made the strands silky and smooth again, to watch as they fell over her shoulders and...

Such rapture.

I knew that I should probably lower my head at once lest she peek from behind the sheer curtains and see me, my golden eyes glowing from the dark, but I defiantly refused to. I felt as a cat, a feline, a panther relentlessly hunting it's prey, only it's golden eyes showing through the tall grasses. Was I not as graceful? Was I not as clever? Monsieur le Viscount certainly had thought so; he had even said as much as he shot at me as my eyes shimmered in the darkness on his balcony.

Christine rose abruptly, moving from the window, and the spell was broken. I whistled softly into the dark and hooves were immediately pounding toward me. I stood, righted myself, and glanced over my shoulder only once more at the receding shadow.

It was then that I made my decision and sealed my fate.

"Come, Exodus," I purred in my velvet voice. Anticipation rippled through me, sending a delightfully painful shiver down my spine. Exodus must have been able to feel it coming from me in waves, for all at once he danced sideways again, and I laid a calming hand on his heaving flank. "Come, Exodus, let us take our leave. Let us sleep a little tonight--for tomorrow, we conquer."

And conquer I would. I was a hunter, a Conquistador, Don Juan Triumphant. I had no doubts that I would find contentment at the end of my triumph, and so could easily lay down on the hard ground without any qualms.

But tonight, ah, tonight, I would smile at the stars as I dreamed of golden locks that turned to silk, of a sumptious mane that I could wind my fingers in. I wondered then if her hair would still hold the sent of lilac, lilac and sometimes rain.

Such sweet dreams. Such agonizing anticipation. My beloved was waiting for me, waiting for me amidst finery and the veils of grief. A joyous thought at the perfect irony of it, the perfect wonderment at her complexity. Yes, perhaps now she would be able to see, to accept, and if Fate allows, to love.

Perhaps it is odd to take joy in such a perverse and invasive way, but it is a joy that is only fit for monsters as I, and I have no qualms about greedily taking all that I can hold. Those such as I are not made for the amicable things in life.

Love is not blind.


	7. Chapter 7

The wind whipped about me, raising Exodus' ebony mane toward my face as I was hunched low over him, breathing in his warmth as a defense against the bitter cold. It also provided some cover, as it was nearly dawn, and I had chosen to grace my loathsome face with my familiar white mask. Unfortunately, it stood out in the darkness, once a great asset, was now a burden. Still, it would be worth it to have the Angel recognize me, to see and to know that I was here.

I brushed an absent hand down the front of my waistcoat and vest, all the while keeping my eyes riveted on the spot of light that radiated out into the pre-dawn gray. I had taken extraordinary lengths this morning to ready myself, had even taken the time to carefully polish my boots and painstakingly brush Exodus until he too shone. I gave a quick tug on my cravat, relishing the wine-colored silk. Perhaps wine was not the correct metaphor...Perhaps it should have been...blood. Yes, just perfect. Not just any sort of blood, mind you, but the sort that is only bled from a wound that has penetrated an artery, thick, burgundy blood. I chose this cravat, my favorite, as it was of a superior material and had slowly dressed in my good suit that I had hastily packed. It is, after all, not every day that a man, no less a monster, is blessed with the opportunity to lay seige to his love once more.

Exodus whuffled quietly, tossing his head back. I tightened my grip on the double rein, and stared, fixated on that one light. I would wait an eternity if I had to--haven't I already?--for that light to be extinguished, to signal the Angel's flight.

A shiver gripped my spine and worked its way down to my toes. Oh, but the anticipation was thick in the air, like electricity before a storm. I waited. I stared.

And I shivered.

***********************

A glimpse of rustling silk and a veiled head is all the sight that I was granted of my angel before she climbed carefully into her waiting carriage. I watched for a moment as the carriage lurched into motion, then wheeled Exodus running and sent him into the thick blackness of the forest.

Occasionally the trees would thin, and I would be able to catch sight of the grand carriage as it rolled silently through the hills and trees. I would slow Exodus then, and allow myself the luxury of staring for a moment, trying in vain to see in the curtained windows.

The driver abruptly slowed the horses, pulled them back slightly. My sharp eyes focused between Exodus' sharply pointed ears. I would have to hurry now, gallop this last stretch in order to be in place.

The gates were just up ahead.

I chose the spot where I would lay in wait until I would reach out for my love, reach out for her and take her once more.

At last, after waiting so long that I was certain that I must have died in that spot, but really only a few moments, the large iron gates creaked open, and then fell shut with a dull clang.

How odd, that my entire life, my fate, should rest in the hands of one so small. All my waiting, my planning, my anticipation was now hanging in the balance as I waited for her to come into view.

Her footsteps crunched in the snow, drawing nearer, closer, oh, I could reach out and touch her...

**AN: Thanks all of you lovely reviewers out there--a big round of gin and cupcakes for you. I'm looking to finish getting this uploaded today or maybe tomorrow. It's not an especially long one, just to let you guys know.**


	8. Chapter 8

I had watched, transfixed, as the angel passed through the metal gates, her footsteps light, but unhurried. Her beautiful face was bent with grief, her eyes downcast. Never before had I seen her so sorrowed, and her sadness was such that it was nearly tangible, reaching out through the cold air to wrap about me.

She followed the meandering path, in no particular hurry, carefully picking her way over the poorly maintained cobblestones. My breath froze as she passed in front of me, directly in front of the shadow that hid my form. I closed my eyes lest she see them glowing in all their retched yellowness. Oh, I could touch her! I only had to reach out my hand, to touch her face, her hand, anything, oh, just so long as I could touch her! Yes! I stretched out my dead hand--

But then she was gone, her cloak sweeping the ground behind her, and I shook my head, my weakness vanishing. I cursed my stupidity, and my lust.

Carefully, and oh so silently, I slid from my hiding place behind the large marble monument, and followed in her footsteps as she made her daily pilgrimage. I gave a pause for a moment as I looked down at her tiny, delicate footprints in the snow. They looked fleeting, as if a bird had made them and then scurried on.

I sneered at her devotion, her faith, yet at the same time, I found my fragmented heart beginning to crumble; my death had not warranted such faith, such caring. I had merely achieved a hurried burial for a corpse that was not dead, at least, all the way, and a plain golden band on my finger. I had no headstone, no places for the masses to come and mourn.

No matter. She would mourn my death with me, and then we would live in the utmost happiness, for our broken hearts would mend each other, and such joy the world would not have seen before. Surely she could make me into a live, breathing man, a man with living flesh and a full heart.

I paused in my pursuit as she knelt before a familiar headstone, said a brief prayer, then continued her journey toward the upper end of the cemetery, to the prominent section, where they buried war heroes, and certainly not penniless peasant violin players.

They had erected a massive monument for the estranged Viscount, matched only by his brother's, the poor Count Philliipe. Christine had undoubtedly protested his family's insistence to build him a palace in death when they had ignored him in life, their love, their marriage, but out of respect for his memory, she had held her tongue. What a shame that they only reached out to the happy pairing when their beloved viscount was dead.

It smacks of irony, of course, as it must--Christine had become as I once was: Shunned by all that had known her, resented, left with no company but her own grief and mourning. I could only hope that her mansion the viscount had built for her, with all its grandeur and lavicious furnishings, felt as empty and cold as the abandoned Opera had to me. Perhaps now, only now, would she be able to understand my pain, my suffering, my love...my jealousy.

My obsession.

Perhaps now she would finally have the ability to love me.

She finally knelt again, and pushed the hood of her cloak off, revealing her fair hair. She prayed long and fervent, and she began to weep. I took no small pleasure in it, and felt almost as if I wold burst from the joy of seeing her broken by despair. Oh, how the mighty fall!

Now. It would have to be now, now while her sapphire eyes were staring up at his tribute, her eyes bleary with tears. Now while she could think of nothing but her all-consuming pain that hid within her body, waiting to leap out at the opportune moment.

"Oh, Raoul," she murmured through her tears. I froze as I heard her voice for the first time in oh, who knows how long, and moreover who cares. It was fuller, richer, thick with her sorrow. Yet my heart was rather untouched by her pitiful expression; no, my heart hardened at the sound of his name, and I moved forward with resolve, keeping to the shadows. "Why have you left me, Raoul? Why?"

"Christine," I whispered to the wind, and she froze, moved no more.

"Raoul?" she asked, her yes darting around, frightened but hopeful. I found my teeth glued together as I gritted them in my annoyance. She did not know her angel anymore.

"Christine," I called again, gently, but with more volume, holding the last vowel longer, beckoning to her. Her eyes widened at the sound of her name echoing about her on the frozen wind, unsure of where it was coming from. The light was beginning to dawn in her eyes, and she shook her head violently, disbelieving.

"No," she said, beginning to weep again. "No, no he's dead. Please, Lord, no!"

Oh, but the gratification! The joy! The overwhelming triumph at hearing the fear in her voice! She still knew that sound, knew that only I could throw my voice such as this! Only I had called to her through the walls of her dressing room in such a way.

"Christine,"I called again, softer, beckoning, wrapping about her...

She cut her eyes to the west, straining to see something, anything, and as she did, I took my place where I must, behind the large marble monument, my chest puffed out with pride. Hah! I was the Opera Ghost!

"Christine..."

"No...Raoul? Please, Raoul, do not toy with me as such! If it is you, then please, let me know. Please," she begged. looking once more to his stone, his engraven name staring back at her. Still such a child, a frightened, lost child.

"Wandering child," I sang, so delicately, so softly. She gasped then, her hand flying to her mouth. Yes, she knew. She could feel it, could feel the music, the exquisite music wrapping about her mind, pulling her, toying with her.

"I'm going mad! It is not you! It cannot be!" she cried, trying desperately to cling to reality, but I could see her slipping, slipping farther...

"Have you forgotten your Angel?"

"No angel born in Heaven ever sang as this," she whimpered, the tears falling again, no longer from grief, no, this time from fear. "Please, have mercy."

"So lost, so helpless..." and her eyes closed, her sooty lashes falling to rest on her alabaster cheeks, finally succumbing to the familiar sound of my voice.

"What endless longings echo in this whisper," she sang, her voice barely audible, and she stood slowly, her body trembling.

"Too long you've wandered in winter, far from my far-reaching gaze..." Oh, yes! The music was flowing through my veins now, humming just under my skin, so pleasurable I thought I would melt from it.

"Who is it there, staring?"

"Have you forgotten your angel?"

"Wildly my mind beats against you, yet my soul obeys," oh, our voices! They mingled as two lovers might, entwined, desperate, searching, scrambling, for that velvety ecstasy when nothing earthly could possibly matter. Her voice touched mine, cautious, fearful, but it was there all the same.

"Angel of music, I denied you, turning from true beauty! Angel of music, I accept you--Come to me, strange angel!" Seh began slowly, deliberately walking closer to the marble edifice as if she were in a dream...

"I am your Angel of Music! Come to me Angel of Music..." She reached out her hand, her little hand, trusting, and suddenly I was in the dream with her, for as I stretched out my gloved hand to touch her, the air that it moved through was honey, thick and sweet.

So rapturous! So joyful! Such trust! Oh, she had to love me, she must! Her bright eyes at hearing my voice, her outstretched hand...

I reached for her, and when my fingertips brushed her palm, I was no longer in a hurry, desperate, no; I was patient, ready to move with resolve. Her hand had been curled slightly, caged almost, but now, as she carefully, deliberately stretched for me, she straightened her fingers as they touched my palm so that they slid deliciously against my fingers. Oh, God, it was too much...That innocently erotic gesture pushed my already heated blood past the boiling point, oh, yes, God, she was touching me...

"Angel," she breathed, and then her strength failed her, her eyes fluttered, ans her frail body crumpled. I moved without thinking, with all the prowess I had ever had, and caught her before she could touch the ground.

As I kneeled there, on the frozen ground, her small frame in my hands, _mine_, my mind nearly stopped working as I took in her porcelain face, the dark circles below her large eyes, her bloodless lips that were parted slightly. I shifted her weight slightly in my arms, and reached up with a cautious hand, gently, delicately touching her face, her cheeks, her mouth through the leather of my gloves.

I straightened suddenly, and lifted her effortlessly as I stood. She slumped bonelessly in my arms, like a sacrificial offering. Her body slid against mine as we stood, and a shudder passed through me like a cold wind.

I shivered.


	9. Chapter 9

**AN: So, hey y'all. I really, really apologize for not updating this quicker, but... Okay, here's the thing: I sorta hate this story right now. I sincerely don't feel like it's an accurate portrayal of wear I am in terms of a writer or even as a person, y'know? Like I am about to choke on some of this Purple Prose. As it is, I'm not even bothering to go through and fix formatting things like italics and whatever. I'm just trying to hurry up and get the rest of it uploaded for you lovely people that have been kind enough to review. **

Even until the last moment that I deposited her on the back steps of her house that no doubt lead to servants' quarters, she remained blissfully unaware. I wished for a moment to linger, to memorize her delicate fingers curled into themselves, her honey curls falling about her blushed face...

Voices, very near to the door, had my head snapping up. I spared her one more glance, a brush on the cheek, then hurried into the night as the door flew open and a middle-aged woman pushed a young boy out, nearly trampling Christine.

"Don't come back till you've found her, Pierre!"

"But--but here she is!"

A flurry of activity, rushed voices, and then the door slammed and the beam of light was cut off. Behind my mask, I could feel a smile forming.

* * * * * * * * * *

I watched, out in the snow-covered grass, as someone stoked the fire in her room, and then all become a mass of indistinguishable shadows. I finally turned away, satisfied that I had achieved such a dramatic response from her.

Perhaps, though, I shouldn't have felt that I was drifting, as if in a dream, lost in disbelief. I shook my head as I carefully mounted, placing each limb just so, because really, if one is going to attempt to ride such an impressive animal for appearance sake, then one should make every reasonable attempt not to fall upon one's face.

Was this just some gloriously lucid dream? Would I wake tomorrow, still huddled among the remnants of my empty lair? Was I sitting not on the edge of the lake, shivering, but on the edge of madness?

I surprised myself with a quick burst of laughter, like a shot in the dark. Of course I was teetering on the blissful edge of madness--it was my duty.

* * * * * * * * * *

As the daylight slowly crept into being, I found myself equally reluctanct to remove myself from sleep. I allowed myself to lay for a moment, staring at the lightening sky through a maze of branches. Then, suddenly, memories of last night began flooding my mind, filling my senses as I recalled how beautiful she still was, a little older, perhaps, but still beautiful. Her voice...her voice had trembled and shaken as one unsure of it, as if she hadn't used it since...since. I covered my face with my hands, and breathed deep.

I was conflicted. I am a man of intense planning and thought, and to find myself at a loss was most frustrating. Everything up until last night had all been a hope, a prayer tossed out; I had thought endlessly of the steps up until now, as they were quite simple. Now that I had seen her, had found her, had proved that she still, in her heart of hearts knew me, I was lost.

Well. I would just have to move one day at a time. And step one would be to check on the welfare of my fair mistress.

* * *

An unfamiliar carriage was in the circular drive. I narrowed my eyes. It wouldn't do to have a suitor busying himself in my affairs, and I was growing oh so weary of being a murderer.

A portly man emerged from within the house, narrow glasses perched on his nose, a leather bag in his hand and...Ah. Yes, he was the doctor, no doubt, fetched to check upon the Madame's condition. He briskly shook the hand of the woman that had followed him out. He climbed into his carriage with no small amount of cursing, and finally was off.

For a brief, heart-pounding moment, she looked about the lawn of the estate, her gaze stopping to rest very near to where I crouched within the deep shadows of a bush. For once in my life, I was grateful for the sunlight, for my golden eyes would no doubt have shown in the night, much as a predator's would. She finally turned away, and the door slammed with finality.

I watched as the doctor's carriage sped hastily away, back in the direction of the town. The town...Yes...There would have to be records, someone would have to know...

Oh, how satisfying, how beautiful...It was like having a golden light behind my brain, the wondrous beginnings of a brilliant thought...Yes. I knew now. I knew everything.

The occupants of the opulent manor no doubt wondered what that terrible laughter could be from.


	10. Chapter 10

I hover over the angel, and watch her sleep, watch as her breath pulls in and out through parted lips. Her sighs, the way her hands curled into themselves, the way she melted into the blankets... Such treasures that are burned into my memory. How I need her.

And yet, a curious feeling of celibacy steals over me, a blend of guilt and anxiety. A moment, and the feeling has passed.

Oh, but to be beside her, to feel her weight shift as she slumbers, to be there to hear all her murmurs through the night, to see her face painted silver in the moonlight! When she wakes, it must be like the sunrise, like life given to the dead. I wish to bow and bend before her, to lay prostrate as she loads abuses upon me, to once again be her faithful servant.

No. Retribution must be more than to make myself as a swine before her again; I must be her equal, and if I cannot, then she shall be subservient.

Bold from my validated thoughts, I lean over her, one hand braced above her head, and oh, just a touch away from tangling in that mass of golden curls, holding them, crushing them in my fist. I must kiss her. I must! It is no longer a moment of weakness, or just a lucid dream. It is a need, as much as the air that seemed stalled inside my body.

My face lowers toward hers, disaster moving into beauty, my lips, oh my wretched lips! A mere whisper from her mouth, parted as though she knew that I was there, waiting to be kissed.

The sheets sigh against her skin as she shifts in the ornate bed, and her arms raise above her head, her fingers coming alive in a slow dance. I'm caught for a moment in wonder, watching her fists clench and relax, and finally come to rest, one nestled in her hair, the other brushing my fingers. In the process, her head shifted to the side, exposing her ivory neck. It would be a fine thing to place my nose against her warm skin, to bury my head in the curve just above her shoulder.

And then...

Her eyes flew open, suddenly, as though one waking from a bad dream. Her sapphire eyes darted around for a moment, and as she turned, I always already lost in shadow. All that she saw were two golden eyes, and perhaps the glimmer of moonlight reflected on my mask.

Or perhaps it was just a dream...

* * * * * * * *

I had been bold in going to her in the dead of the night, made brave by my discoveries. Those moments spent watching her sleep, bathed in moonlight had been my payment for spending hours upon hours bent over ledgers and books, poring endlessly over them, considering, planning, and above all, thinking. What I had suspected had become overtly obvious as the moments plodded on, and I wanted to laugh, to cry, to fly from the building as it became so clear, and what had started as a spark became the golden light of a plan.

She would have no choice but to accept my offer, repulsed as she may be, but she would consent in the end; I had found her weakness, and exploiting it would be to my intense pleasure.

Nobility was such a cruel caste.


	11. Chapter 11

Of course, the true dilemma was how does one approach the woman you hope to spend your pitiful remaining days with, and subject her to your whims? A paradox.

It goes without saying that I have a...flair for the dramatic. Yes, a glimpse, a glimmer and then a flick of the cloak and I'm gone. Yet, has she had enough of ghosts? Am I bold enough to look at her, to bore my golden eyes into the sapphire of her own, and to feel her bend, to yield, to give into my wishes?

Yes.

A thousand times over, yes.

I felt as a Spaniard, a Conquistador, confident, proud. I carried myself with my shoulders squared and my jaw jutting proudly upward. I rode tall in the saddle and for the first time in many, many years, I went confidently into the daylight. Those that passed me on the road refused to meet my eyes; the rest of my face was hidden behind my cloak.

Did they think that I was Death? Was I the embodiment of some disastrous plague? Heavens, yes! Run from before me, for I am some great and terrible storm gathering on the horizon! Do you not hear the thunder rolling beneath me? Can you not feel the Earth tremble and shake?

I passed through the wrought iron gates without a hesitation, pulling to a halt haughtily before the grand entrance. I spared a glance from beneath the brim of my hat, just a glimpse, really, up to the window of the room that Christine called her own.

I'm certain that my eyes were shining when I banged heavily upon the sturdy wooden door. My keen ears detected the flurry of footsteps behind the door, a rustle of skirts.

The door pulled open, and suddenly, a great bitter wind came up, whipping the volumes of black fabric about me, billowing up like the tide. The young maiden's eyes widened, and for a moment, she froze. She opened her timid mouth to speak, but before she could utter a sound, I had already announced myself in a voice that sounded like a rockslide.

"I must speak to Madmois--the Viscountess DeChagny; it is of great importance," I boomed, cursing myself inwardly for the slip.

"Yes...I...yes. What may I tell her this call is--"

"It is of a personal nature, my dear, now if you would be so kind as to fetch her before I die of exposure," I snapped. Her large brown eyes blinked in surprise, and then she was stepping back, allowing me to pass.

The door thudded shut behind us, and she indicated with one arm a sitting room just off the foyer that had a fire roaring heartily in the hearth.

"May I take your...cloak and hat, sir?" I dismissed her with an elegant flick of my wrist, and stood before the fire.

"I will fetch my mistress then."

* * *

I could sense the weariness in her bones as she paused in the doorway, her brow furrowing in confusion. She took a cautious step forward, her hand resting on the door-frame as if she needed an anchor to the outside world. I was near enough to her to watch the gooseflesh rise on her neck as she took in the hat that rested upon the table, the voluminous cape thrown casually over the settee. Yes, she could feel the charge in the air, the chill in the room.

The dance had begun.

She stepped; I followed. She turned, she twisted, she craned her graceful neck, her elegant hands were poised. My hands hovered delicately close to her body, a ghost's breath between us.

She inhaled--we nearly touched.

We spun, we hovered, we slid around each other, our shadows embracing, touching, caressing...

And, at last, as the dream was clearing from behind my eyes, I leaned forward, my lips a whisper from the back of her neck, and I spoke.

"Christine."


	12. Chapter 12

Her lips.

Oh, God, her lips.

Her hair…her shining hair that flew behind her when she spun so gracefully, still so poetic in her movement…

Her mouth hung open for a minute as the proverbial dust settled between us, as if she was incapable of understanding what had happened, how I had come to be. Her lips started to form a word, and I knew that she wanted to say my name, my name that might make me real, make me mortal, and she quickly snapped her mouth shut.

"Why are you here?"

"Oh, Christine, come now. Surely your years amongst the glittering people have taught you more manners than that," I sneer, drawing myself up, prideful.

"Manners do not apply to ghosts, and since that is most assuredly what you are, I refuse to offer them so freely."

"Oh? An apparition, am I? Then tell me, my dearest, how are you so certain that I am not of flesh and blood?"

"Because," she said, "you promised to die. You said that you would die from love, and upon such occasion I would have peace. If I'm not mistaken, I dredged myself down to that awful cellar and buried you myself. I…I buried you…" And for the first time her cool veneer cracked. She blinked away the quick flutter of emotion, and stepped forward as if to leave, but here I was, filling the door way, chest proudly puffed and head held high.

"I have no time for this, Er-- I don't have the patience, nor the heart for foolish games anymore. Ghost or not, you are not welcome here."

"Sadly, I have neither as well. I wish, Christine--"

"Do not utter my name once more! It is not yours to have! Oh, if I have to hear one more syllable pass through your dead mouth, I shall surely die of horror! It is mine! It's all I have left of…of…" She removed her hands that she had clamped over her ears in her haste to leave, and the light dawned in her pretty eyes.

"You. That's why you're here, isn't it? You do not come out of love, or even of compassion--you come for your chance at vengeance, for lust. You do not come because you care for me! You come because your foolish pride tells you that I must surely belong to you, because the one I have loved most dearly is no more! Oh, wretched, wretched man! That is why you are here, isn't it?"

"No." Yes.

The tirade seemed to wear her out, and she collapsed quite heavily upon the settee. I wished to touch her then, to simply place my hand upon her shoulder, but I dared not.

"Why, then? Why can I not be left alone with what little life I still have in me?"

"Do you still sing, Christine?" I asked quite abruptly.

"What? You have come all this way to disrupt my peace to ask if--"

"No. Forgive me." Of course I did, foolish girl. Do you not know that I lived and breathed what little torturous bit I did just to hear your golden voice? Do you not know yet that your song is the very blood I have running through my veins? "I have come to help, Mlle. Daae."

She laughed then, a cruel harsh laugh, and for the first time in our time together, I knew that she was mocking me. Orange flashed through my brain, a bright hateful color, and before I could stop my lanky limbs from acting, I had seized her roughly by the wrists, squeezing tightly, so tight that I could hear the bones grinding together mercilessly. I wanted so badly to tighten more, to shake her until--

She cried out then, her eyes wide. I blinked back the rage then, and went before her on bended knees, but not to beg. No. Never again.

"Please, just go. You promised, you promised both of us to leave us in peace. Now please, just go, go back to whatever cellar you find suitable," she begged, trying hard to twist free of my cold fingers. "You can't--"

"I know of your…situation, Mlle. Daae. I know what you stand to lose. I know what that self-righteous family intends to do as well as you do. They loved their dear Viscount, loved him most tenderly, but they have no room in their gilded halls for you. You, the little stage-nymph that seduced him most effectively away." I stood then, quite slowly, for the damp and cold had seized into my joints. "I did give my word that I would leave you be. I intended to do just that, my dear, but you see, the dearly departed Viscount didn't live up to his end of the bargain." I turned then, standing before the fireplace, the flames silhouetting my tall frame. "He gave his word to look after you, to protect you as I once had. He swore to be your guiding light, to keep you safe. He quite clearly can't do that now from the bottom of the merciless sea."

She turned her bright eyes to me, and for a moment, they were as clear and innocent as the first day I saw her, that brilliant spring morning.

I nearly went mad. In that bright, beautiful moment I nearly lost the tiny sliver of sanity that I had left as I felt myself falling into her crystalline eyes, tumbling, lost…

"I will save you, Christine. I will save you from these cruel creatures and the bitter winter."

"But who will save me from you?"


	13. Chapter 13

The sapphire was gone from her eyes.

They had instead become as grey and merciless as the ocean, and no less tumultuous. The anger had left her body, her limbs slack as her eyes roamed over the yellowed papers strewn over the large table in the formal dining room.

Oh, how I relished this moment. How delicious it was to see her here, before me, defeated, submissive, and desperately in need of my help.

It was perfect. It was divine. It as inspired.

"It would appear, my dear, that you do in fact need rescuing," I all but crowed. I could have sung with happiness! Oh, the joy! There was such beauty ni the brilliance of my mind. How could I have been blessed with such a golden thing as the wonder of my intelligence, and yet, be so cursed as to have such a face that no one would dare come close enough for me to share it with? Oh, gods of Irony.

"It would appear, Monsieur Fantome, that I have no choice." The corners of my mouth tipped upward slightly and I'm certain that I swelled in size from sheer pride. "Oh, don't look so smug, you vile man. There is nothing noble about shoving one into a corner and gloating over it. You are no white knight," she spat, her eyes narrowed to slits.

"Nobility is not worthy of me! No mortal is!" I shouted, standing quite suddenly, knocking the ornate chair to the floor. "Save you, Christine. You alone are the saving grace amongst these fools, my angel, my Christine."

"I am not yours, you filthy thing! I freed myself the day Raoul and I walked from that filthy nightmare of a cellar with you blessing!"

A sharp pain passed through my body, originating from somewhere deep within my bowels. How badly I wanted to wrap my hands around her beautiful neck, to watcher her squirm and draw her last breaths, and how badly I wanted nothing more than to kiss her pouting lips.

My lanky fingers clenched and released in fists with rapid succession. I thrust my chin proudly in the air, my chest puffed slightly. Christine drew back slightly, as if she wanted to cower but dare not give me the satisfaction, but she refused to let her cold stare leave mine.

She had become bold in my absence.

It was laughable, yet, I found myself wishing to weep instead. Had these people, these cruel nobles, ruined her?

Had I?

What a complex thing, these accursed emotions. I was Don Juan! I was not to weep in front of the very woman that I intended to conquer!

I allowed myself the deep pleasure of watching her for a moment, of studying how her whole body seemed to move with the effort of her panting breath, the quick dart of her tongue. I turned to the large window, staring out into the frozen gardens.

"Why will you not say my name, Christine? I come here to you, my dear, to save you from this bitter fate, and yet you still refuse to call me by my name?" I murmured.

A shuffle of skirts and she was suddenly standing quietly behind me, near enough to reach out her dove's hand and touch me. She would not.

"Because I fear that it will make you real, that it will make you of flesh and blood and bone, and this will not be a horrible nightmare anymore," she whispered. "I said it once before, and it made you a mortal. I shall not make that mistake again."

_"Oh, horror, horror, horror," she cried, and it seemed that he night echoed her cry thrice more. Their young eyes darted around, but nothing could be seen..._

_"Erik...Even his name fills me with such fear..."_

I lowered my head, my brow knitted together. I passed a hand in front of my eyes and let it remain on my temple. Christine remained tactfully silent; she recognized when I had adopted the posture of deep thought. How well we knew each other, how strangely intimate we still were.

Several moments passed in complete silence with only the muffled noises of the dark-eyed servant in the kitchen and the fire crackling heartily. The minutes ticked by, marked by the distinct sounds of a rather large and excessively unappealing clock in the corner. Hatred for that ugly thing that mared such a beautiful room, with the dark woods and wonderful Oriental rug beneath the stout table, reared up suddenly, unexplainably.

It had the mark of the taste of the late Viscount.

I whirled quickly, making Christine start. She fluttered like a bird for a moment, as if deciding whether to flee or to cry. I held my head up proudly, enjoying my height over her.

"I am a man of my word, Mademoiselle Daae. I shall not stray from our agreement. You shall keep your cherished home, and I shall have the satisfaction of your company once more."


	14. Chapter 14

_All was silver and gold…_

_Her doe's eyes were wide, fixed, unseeing. The Angel reached out her hand, raptured. What was once solid became a liquid dream. Everything was a mad swirl of glass and lust. She faltered, she fluttered, and the Shadow caught her. He drew her into himself, wrapping her in the folds of darkness that hung about fought him, struggled to unfurl herself from the night that seemed to smell of earth, of dirt, of…_

_Death._

_He leaned down, and breathed hot words into her ear, his lips barely brushing past her lobe. His embrace tightened, pressing her into a body made of iron. She slumped against him, her head falling below his chin._

_They turned, and she slid the length of him, falling, and as she did, the vision before his eyes stopped being a gilded dream and a shadow of red fell across his eyes. His blood hummed through his veins, rhythmic. Her eyes were closed, the eyelashes the color of amber falling across her cheek. Her mouth was slack, the lips carved from ruby parted._

_The Shadow pressed his face close to hers, and was rewarded by a moist breath that passed by his cheek, smelling of a dream. He ached, he longed, his skin thrummed beneath the darkness that was his to hide in._

_He wished for nothing more than to bury his nose, his face, his whole being into the graceful slope where her neck met her shoulder, her heavy curls holding the warmth and scent of her body._

_As his body writhed and burned of its own accord, the Angel slipped from his grasp, sliding from between his fingers to become a pile of golden sand upon the stone floor. He began to weep fragile tears, but as he sank to his knees in despair, he beheld that the sand smelled of the dawn, lavender, and…Christine._

_He slid onto his belly and buried himself in the golden warmth, rolling, falling, burning, and sobbing. He did not mind that the sand scratched his skin, or that it snuck into the seams of his clothing; no, for he tore of his clothes like a mad man so that he could feel the dirt made of sun on his naked flesh, to taste it, and oh, it was sweeter than any wine, it was too much…_

Awareness jolted into my brain, as welcome as a bucket full of ice and water. Moonlight spilled across the bed that I had claimed, revealing the twisted sheets damp with sweat. I touched my face, and was for a moment confused by the coolness, but then it was only my mask.

Why was I awake?

A persistent rhythm still beat beneath my skin, gathering in a mass of tribal drums at my loins. But that hadn't awoken me. Something was wrong. Voices, close, in the hall.

I kicked at the bedding, cursing the stupidity of a traditional bed, longing for my coffin. Both feet touched the floor at the same time, nimble as a cat, oblivious to the frigid floor. I became one with the shadows cast about my room, fluid as mercury.

Christine obviously was ignorant to the board in the top of my wardrobe that led into the space between the ceiling and the attic floor. She probably also was unaware of my ability to squeeze into it, thankful for once for my thin body, and the gap between the eave of the house and her timbered ceiling.

As I slithered on my belly like a snake, light leaked through the slats of the boards above her chambers. Someone had re-lit the candles and stoked the fire. The voices grew louder.

"Milady, your gown is soaked through. Please, step out of bed and allow me to help you with it," a throaty voice begged. Sophie, the young girl that was round of body and dark eyed.

"No, it is fine. I do not wish to feel the cold air on my skin," Christine murmured, her voice still heavy with sleep.

"At least let me warm the bricks for you," Sophie offered, and hearing no protest, began the business of digging them out from under the down blankets and setting them on the fire. She pushed them about with the poker for a moment, then glanced over her shoulder toward the large bed where Christine was sitting up, her golden curls falling about her shoulders. "You poor mistress," she began, her tone that of an all-forgiving mother. "Did you dream of the sea again?"

"No, I did not," Christine demurred. Silence. I shifted my weight so that I might gaze through a different crevice.

"Do you wish to talk about it?" More silence. "Well, it is alright now. All nightmares are banished when the sunrises," she reassured as she slid the warmed bricks back beneath the blankets.

"But what happens when I wake to the nightmare that I have been dreaming for years, and find that it is real?" Sighs. "I'm sorry, Sophie. I have not been the same since the Viscount…since."

"It's alright, Madame. I'll be turning in now, if you don't need anything else."

"Yes, my dear. I am sorry for waking you."

"Not at all. The way you were carrying on, I figured that it would be best for me to come and rescue you," she laughed. The floor creaked as the young maid crossed the room, then paused at the threshold.

"By the way, who is Erik?"


	15. Chapter 15

Breakfast was simply delightful.

Christine did not once glance at me, nor did she speak, only answering Sophie's prodding with quiet little nods. She did not eat, but rather pushed her food about on the fine china. Even though the morning sun streamed in cruelly on my damaged skin, I would not have missed this perverse pleasure for the world.

I, of course, loved every moment of it, and though I did not eat, I made a point of sitting with her at the table until she stood to leave, at which point she would glide into the darkened parlor, and sit with her Bible and read and weep and read some more.

"How did you sleep last night, dear?" I could not help myself. The words slipped past my teeth and my tongue without my knowing how.

She started, her eyes wide and frightened. She blinked several times, comical, and a smile threatened to tug at my face.

"Fine, Monsieur, but I don't see why that's any concern of yours," she murmured coolly. She knew, she had to, that she did not just dream of my golden eyes, but that they watched her at every moment of the day.

She rose, pushed her chair back, and began her pilgrimage to her favorite chair that still held the Viscount's scent and a hint of a pipe. I rose too, not out of good manners, but to stand before her so she could not access the hall.

"You are being quite rude, Monsieur Fantome," she said, throwing her head back. Her haughtiness was astounding.

"No more of your sweet tears today, my darling. I must go to a special place today, and find some things that are much needed. You will do me the honor of accompanying me," I purred, smoothly reaching out to grasp her wrist through the fabric of her sleeve.

"No, I shall not. It is Wednesday, and there is an early Mass, to which I shall be going. Just because you happen to have the means to keep a roof over my head does not make you my keeper," she announced. My fingers flexed, tightening sharply, and she opened her mouth to cry out as if she were still a little girl, but instead she settled on pleading. "Please, I must go. It is not nearly so cold today, and the snow is really quite lovely, and I would like very much to see it. Please," she whispered, her head bowed until the last inquiry, at which she raised her lovely face and blinked her large eyes. She knew that I had no power to resist her when she was so innocent, so plaintive.

A sigh escaped my dried lips.

"I shall drop you at your Mass, and shall return for you within three hours."

* * * * * * * *

Something was different.

Of course, now, if I were asked to name what precisely it was that I was noticing, I could not say exactly what. But then, there, seeing her, I could have named a million tiny nuances that crept into the back of my brain and festered there.

She did not drink her morning coffee anymore. She was slow in rising, and took to having breakfast in bed and spending half the day in her chambers. I could have assumed that she was simply avoiding me, and it's possible that she was. There was more, though. She did not trek to the cemetery anymore; she always waited for the stable master to hitch the horses.

She never went riding anymore, either.

The late Viscount, as one of many fine wedding presents, had gifted her with a beautiful horse the color of spun gold. Christine spent many long hours polishing the mare's coat, braiding her mane, and cooing pretty little noises to her. All of this was decidedly unbefitting for a lady, but I had the distinct feeling that she did not give a damn, and would have said so.

She would not even set a foot into the stable, and let her Delilah's care fall into the hands of the young boy or the old keeper.

Christine had always been slight as a bird, and narrow of hip, but after the sea claimed her lover, she became so frail that it looked like a gust of wind would have sent her back to the heavens, where she had fallen from.

She cried, morning, noon, and night. Her petite little sobs could be heard from behind doors and around corners. It was annoying and pathetic, all at once. I wished to gather her close and pet her fair hair until the sorrow had left her and entered my battered old body, while at the same time I longed for nothing more than to feel the satisfying crack of my hand against her cheek. I wanted to shake her, love her, hold her, strangle her. It was maddening.

I knew then, that something had snapped within her, or possibly awoken, when I confronted her, and instead of receiving the lash of her tongue as I expected, she burst into pretty sobs behind her hands, and told me to sit so that she could look at me as I spoke, not to tower over her as it made her intimidated.

"Oh, my jailer and protector," she wept. She crumbled then, and I wished to hit myself until I bled for causing her so much misery. I wished to pet and stroke my ego until I purred for being so masterful.

"Let's have it out, then," I commanded. Then…Oh, miracle of miracles…

She touched my hand. Mine. Her delicate fingers wrapped around my decaying hand, and I fell onto my knees on the floor before her, sliding from the settee and touching my forehead to the floor in obedience. My own tears salted her alabaster hand.

She only wept harder, and bent so that her head was next to mine.

"Erik," she whispered, and I died a thousand deaths then, and yet still I lived, for I was molten, broken, and burnt. Oh, God of Gods, she had said my name. It had fallen from the perfection of her mouth into my sharp ears.

"Oh, angel of mine," I sobbed, all strength gone, all sanity hers for the taking. "Whatever it is, Erik shall make it right. I will slither on the floor before you, if only it would make you smile. I could make the flowers sing, or have the papers on the desk dance, or a hundred other childish tricks if only it would put the stars back in your eyes!"

"Erik…I am with child."


	16. Chapter 16

She was so damned beautiful.

Everything seemed to delight her, from the way the light entered the windows at the beginning and end of the day, to how the fabric of her dresses laid across her body. Her eyes were constantly wide with wonder, and hardly ever filled with tears, unless it was of joy.

The hair that she had cut off in mourning was quickly reaching the lengths that it used to, cascading far down her back like some golden waterfall. Her skin's alabaster quality reached new heights so that it looked as if she were carved of porcelain. She grew round, and soft, as she indulged every whim and craving that she could possibly dream of; indeed, she was glowing with health and radiance.

I suffered terribly.

Every smile, every joyful exclamation, every hum of satisfaction at some new sweet pierced through my heart. My head pounded during the day, and I stalked about at night, snarling at the shadows and stomping until the floors shook. Sophie, kind soul that she was, had stopped insisting that I eat, but would quietly place a tray of food and tea outside my door in the morning. She had given up engaging me in her snips and banterings, as I had taken to huffing through my nose in distaste at her prodding instead of speaking.

Her joy was my Hell, and she was strong in this knowledge. She would dandle her happiness before me, relishing in the way that I would cringe and seethe at every mention of her swelling belly. I had no doubts about her intentions; with the birth of this boy, of a rightful heir, a way back into _the family's_ heart, she could happily send me back to the grave where I belonged, and everything would be rightfully hers.

She was certain that it was a boy; she meant to call him Raoul.

I wished to shove my hand down my throat and vomit my heart out.

Once, when Sophie was exclaiming over Christine's beauty still more, I could not bear it any longer, and I cracked my head sharply upon the bare wall of my room. The pain was deliciously blinding, and a welcome reprieve. I had hoped that perhaps it would render me mindless for a time, but all that I accomplished was a rather fascinating stream of blood that poured across the valleys and dips of my face.

"Oh! Sophie! Come quick! He has just rolled about!"

I hurled my prized violin against the door, shattering it easily, and starting the ladies down the hall. I cursed my stupidity, her happiness, my splendid pride that had been wounded so deeply.

I was so horrible to her. I would not look at her. I dare not open my dead mouth around her, lest she accuse me of bringing the shadow of death and disease to her.

"Your horse is rather lonely," I announced to the great and foreboding silence one evening. She did not bother to raise her eyes from her Bible.

"Oh? Tell me, Erik, how is she?"

"She has grown fat," I snarled, and Christine's pretty brow beetled at my bluntness.

"You are a horrible, horrible man," she announced as she rose. "You are the horrible shadow of an unhappy man that died and has lost his way to Hell," she spat.

It was her turn to stomp across the beautiful wooden floors.

* * * * * * * *

I had never asked to be permitted into her chambers before.

The elegance that I had guessed at, glanced at, was nothing compared to its true splendor. The rugs were rich and thick, her blankets filled with down, and the windows were thick, leaded glass. The floors had been burnished and stripped, and re-burnished until they shone with a life all their own.

I was nervous. Wonder of wonders, I was nervous. My feet drug across the floor in a way that belayed my state of mind.

"What can I assist you with this evening?" was the stiff greeting I received from the bed that she sat up in. I pulled deeper beneath the brim of my hat, hiding in the depths and folds of my cloak. Her lip curled up in distaste. "You have been gone a long time," she observed without pulling her eyes from the small book in her hands.

"I wished to bring back the love of my heart a treasure for her to behold," I said, and spread my hands wide before her. The pools of blue in her face narrowed in suspicion. "But what sort of treasure? I could not bring her gold, for her hair was spun of the finest gold ever to be unearthed." I slid closer to her, gesturing in grand ways with my long arms spread wide. "I could not bring her jewels, for her eyes were the purest blue sapphires ever to be beheld." Another flourish, another twist. "Roses of the most precious vine would not do, either, for this goddess of the North has lips full of more velvet and delicate beauty than any red rose could promise." I stood directly before her, towering over her as she lay. "So what do I bring to the one who has everything?"

She cocked her right eyebrow, clearly intrigued. A small grin crept past my icy exterior as I spread my hands wide, one over the other, revealing a small box of some sort of ridiculous sweet that she had been wishing for over a fortnight. Her eyes popped wide, and a small gasp of surprise radiated.

"The trick, my darling, is catching them," I said and began to twirl my skeleton's fingers about, making the box appear to dance. She smiled then, and raised her hand as if to reach for them, but I slid from her reach. "Now, do you really think that I would expect a creature such as yourself to be content with a box of mere sweets? No! These are no ordinary sweets!" I exclaimed. The box began to sing, a rather silly children's song about a fly who pestered a toad, who was eaten by a bird, who was eaten by a jackal, who was caught by a shepherd and given to his wife to put into a stew.

Christine giggled like a girl once more, her hands clasped together in joy.

"Oh, Erik!" she gasped. "That is wonderful! Oh, where did you find these? I must have sent Sophie and everyone else through half of France to try and find them!"

"Ah, but that is a secret for Erik's keeping and no one else's. Is it not the silliest, most splendid trick you ever saw?" I said proudly, my chin tilted high.

"Yes, it is, and if you do not give them to me soon, I shall truly make you dead and buried."

* * * * * * * *

The madness eased with time. I found myself wishing to be able to do nothing more than to tickle her fancy. I devised simple little songs that made her smile, I fetched her whatever her heart desired, and I would parade her beloved Delilah below the window of her room and around the parlor windows so that she might admire the way that she picked up her feet and the ease with which her mane and tail flowed.

On cold nights, when the house would seem so empty and forlorn and the wind would whip around the corners of the house so that it howled in anguish, only then would I pull a beloved violin from its case, and I would stroke its strings with all the love that I could muster, and it sang of loneliness, of death, of love that would never come to be. I would weep without reserve for the one that would never truly be mine, and the whole world would weep with me.

I had to temper Christine's unabashed joy with despair so dark, so mournful, that it would pull me back into the pools of madness that hid their faces during the day. The eyes of the Sultana would watch me over my shoulder, and the cries of the dead and murdered would be my accompaniment, keeping time.

_"Sing,"_ she would command, and I would shriek out horrible songs that sounded like the keening of a banshee.

Christine would cower deep beneath her blankets, and she would pray and cry out at the madness.

Paradise, no matter how cleverly crafted, can not abide with Death, nor with Sorrow.

She had forgotten that.


	17. Chapter 17

She was positively ungraceful. Her feet betrayed her at every turn, her stride became short and stuttered. For all of the beauty that had become hers, it seemed that the price would have to be her marvelous sense of balance.

She was horribly bored. Her hands were never idle, and she longed for any sort of news from the world outside of the house. If one were to leave, she would pounce upon he or she upon their return and demand to know every detail of the journey. Because of her boredom, she became aloof and churlish, refusing to even bless me with a smile, despite my having become her personal jester. I had stopped short of groveling at her feet like an obedient dog.

My temper began to flare at her whims and moods, my shoulders lifting and a sensation not unlike that of a thousand stinging bugs would sweep over my skin. My fingers twisted and danced with a mind of their own, aching for some sort of a way to release the tension inside. I slammed every door in the house by turns, and would take to breaking anything fragile or that smelled of expense.

"I have had enough!" I shouted one day in the privacy of the cellar, where I would have my refuge. "No more of this foolishness!"

The rope in my hands felt good. It slid with ease across my skilled fingers, flexing, releasing, pulling it taut. It would be quick, not because I wished it to be, but because of the great skill I had in its use. Quick, perhaps, but so utterly surprising that it would have to be done with great, great care.

* * *

"Oh, Erik!" she cried. "Oh, it is…"

"Just be silent, my dear, and let Erik help you." She touched my glove hand with ease, not minding the texture of the leather, for surely it had more life than poor, poor Erik.

She settled in carefully, minding her skirts and shifting every way to find comfort. When she was finally still, I gently laid a great woven blanket across her lap while Sophie placed a thick shawl over her shoulders.

"Do take care of the lady, Monsieur."

"Do not fear, young maiden, for no more loyal nor protective of a friend could she ever hope for," I sang loudly. I gathered up the reins and let them fall gently across Exodus' broad back. "Walk on," I called to the great stallion, and his onyx hooves pulled easily from the snow, and the ornate sleigh glided across the frozen ground.

"Mind your hands, milady, and keep them tucked into your muff!" Sophie called after us.

A girlish giggle escaped Christine's mouth.

"Is there a problem, Madame?"

"No, Erik. Of course not." She was silent for many moments as we traversed the length of the drive and out onto the road that passed before the brick house. The reins rose and fell once more across the great rump, and Exodus lifted his feet gaily into a gentle trot. "Oh, Erik!" she gasped at the sound of the hundreds of silver bells that I had strung with great care onto the leather harness. "It is beautiful!"

"It was no small feat, either, I can assure you. Many a strong rope this horse has frayed whilst I taught him to mind the reins across his back and not a rider," I murmured.

Her leg was warm against mine. I wished to shout to the skies of the great joy that was mine, now that we could play at being married, just as she and--

No. She was mine now. No more of him. Her eyes shined into my face, her hands brushed mine, her voice said my name, not his. She should have been mine, mine, mine. But she wasn't, and some small part of the madness in my head was lucid enough to know that. I was her dear, dear friend and nothing more.

* * *

All was peaceful after her excursion out of the house. Roses had bloomed across her cheeks and on her petite little nose, but her eyes shown like glass.

She retired to bed without another thought, relinquishing her contentment to sleep. A small smile played across her lips through the night, lifting the worry from her tired face.

I watched her sleep the whole of the night, a great night bird that kept its black wings spread over her, above her, invisible to all.


	18. Chapter 18

None of us were prepared when it happened. We were so engrossed in our personal Hells, our triumphs, our tears and joy, that I was as shocked by it all as Adam must have been when he beheld Eve.

The silence of the gray dawn was pierced by a heart-wrenching shriek that seemed to rattle the heavens. I started upward, forgetting where I was and bashing my head quite hard upon the bulkhead. I glanced down between a crack in the slats and there was Christine, bolt upright in bed, her blankets thrown back to reveal what appeared to be a black puddle pooled between her legs.

Everything froze: Time, my heart, my brain, even Christine's shrill cry. Then everything came roaring back like a freight train, accompanied by a deafening rush through my ears. My blood pumped wildly as everything in my brain screamed that I had to save her, to protect her.

I wriggled and slithered as quickly, albeit quite noisily, as I could from my hiding spot, cursing and scraping my hands along the way. When I reached the square hole that led to my chambers, I fell out like a newborn calf from its mother, most ungracefully, not at all like myself, but how is one supposed to concentrate on being graceful while a tornado tears through one's brain?

I lunged out the door, slid, regained my footing and ran like a mad man for the servants' quarters, my arms and legs flying about me. I screeched to a halt outside the door to where Sophie slept, and commenced banging on them with all my might.

"Sophie!" I cried. "Sophie, come quick!" The door jerked back, startling both of us.

"Erik? What is it?"

"It's…It's Christine! She's bleeding…just come!"

"Oh, God in Heaven," she cried. She seized me roughly by the shoulder. "You must go for the midwife at once," she commanded. "Do not return without her."

* * *

Her face was deathly pale.

The irony of it would have been delicious, had I not been certain that my beloved lay dying.

Her lips, once so red, had faded to a soft pink, moved as she tried to form a coherent thought. "Please…"she murmured. "Please, save him. Do not worry about me, just…save him…"

"Please, Christine, don't speak anymore," Sophie pleaded. The midwife, a large woman with gentle hands and gray hair, responded to neither, and pursed her lips as she pressed on Christine's swollen belly.

"Tell, me dear, how does this feel?"

"Oh! It is horrible!" The midwife shook her head, and looked to Sophie while Christine railed like a woman possessed. "It cannot be now! It is not time!"

"It has to happen now. She is dying, from what I do not know, but she will bleed out if something is not done now." She turned to look at me, in both surprise and disdain. "You. Get out, and leave us be. A woman's travail is no place for a man, even one who is already dead."

"No," Christine whispered. "Let him stay and be with me." She reached out a trembling hand, and grasped my sleeve. I knelt down so that I could murmur in her ear, gently, so gently, of wonderful things that she could dream of. Of course, I also had no desire to watch something that made my beloved so mortal. I was afraid, afraid of the thing inside her that consumed her life.

Hours passed, end over end, tumbling across the face of the clock, so that Christine sweated and cried and shrieked until there was nothing more to give, into the dark of the night.

I had removed everything save my shirtsleeves, as it had fallen to me regulate her breathing with a commanding voice that silenced all except Christine's whimpers. When the pains bore down hard, I would take my voice to her ear, so that only she could hear the wonderful tales a wove, tales of places made of golden sand, of blue snow, of nothing but music. When she was ready to give no more, I would sing to her of the night, of angels that made demons whole with their voices and golden hair. While she squeezed my hand so hard that I was certain that I would never be able to hold a violin again, I shut up my mouth and did not speak to tell her to desist

Everything became silent. A river of dark blood poured from Christine, the river Styx pooling on the sheets. There were no voices raised in triumph, nor were there any sighs of relief from Christine. She lay, motionless, her arms and legs thrown wide, looking like a star that had fallen from heaven.

Oh, heavens, what was I doing here? Why had this angel of song begged me to stay, when I was no more than the Angel of Sorrow? I, who brought with me the shadow of Anubis, who sat with open jaws in the corner of the room.

"Erik…tell me…does he look like me or like…like Raoul?" she whispered. The midwife held the tiny baby in her arms, still, never to cry, and tilted him so that I might see his miniscule face.

"He…he has your perfect little cheeks, like a doll, but his chin is the Viscount's. His hands are fine, very fine, like those that grace you."

Her lips, her precious lips, began to tremble, and then she wept, the tears leaking from the corners of her eyes, flowing down to become part of her golden mane.

"Let me see him," she asked.

"I should think not!" the midwife protested. "It is not proper, especially given your condition! I shall--"

"You shall do nothing," I snarled, coming to stand before her, over her, making her shrink back. "You shall let the Madame see her son so that she may hold him for the first, and for the last time, or I shall remove my mask and look at you with the face of Death, and you shall be my wife as well, for once you look upon me, you shall be mine for all time, which shall be worse than a thousand deaths."

She thrust the baby, whom Sophie had wrapped in a tiny white blanket, at Christine, who could barely lift her arms to take him. The last we heard of the midwife was her hurling curses at all of us back over her shoulder.

"Oh, Sophie. Look at how tiny he is, how his eyelids look like butterfly wings. Oh, and his hair…It is just barely there…" she wept, placing thousands of kisses salted with tears across his face and head, his hands, his tiny little feet.

"Christine…You are still bleeding. You must let him go," Sophie said gently.

"Erik, you must take him. Take him to that place where nothing matters, save the song that we wove together. Place him there, where he shall feel nothing except joy, and hear nothing except your golden voice…Take him into the night, and place him among the stars, just as you did me…" Her eyes slid shut, her long lashes kissing her cheeks, and still she bled.

"Erik, what shall we do? She will surely bleed to death, as you have banished the midwife," Sophie whispered, helpless. I handed her the little one, and thundered off to my quarters, and began pawing madly through the many boxes and trucks that had accumulated.

* * *

The black liquid was thick, and smelled strangely foul, but Sophie did as I told her, patiently handing me whatever I asked her, fetching items as I needed them, only after Christine had called out to her father that she was waiting, waiting for him.

"Oh, Erik, I am so cold," she murmured over pale lips and closed eyes.

"Be strong, my sweeting, and it shall be done quickly." Christine said no more, for she had succumbed to the blackness that nipped at her mind. I touched her wrist, and recoiled at the coldness there.

"Sophie, go draw as much hot water as you can into her bath, as hot as you can possibly make it," I ordered. "Stay here, Christine, stay with me, and we shall go to the summer together, and I shall bring you a thousand shells from the ocean and lay them at your feet. Stay, and I shall write you a thousand operas, each a golden instrument for your voice.

"I shall not make deals with you, God, for you have never been one to be fair, especially to Erik, but it has made me strong, and you cannot have this angel back yet!" I gathered Christine up, holding her tightly to my chest, and carried her like an offering for sacrifice into the tiled powder room where steam was pouring out over the large tub.

"It is not full yet!" Sophie protested. I pushed past her, and submerged Christine into the hot water, soaking my blood-stained shirt, turning the water rose from the blood that flowed off both of us in tiny rivulets.

Many moments passed, and Sophie dumped another kettle of hot water in, my back screaming from bending over to hold her up. Christine's shivering slowly ceased, and her mouth relaxed into a pout that under other circumstances would have been the most divine thing I'd ever seen. Her eyes fluttered for a moment, and she began to move her lips again.

"Erik, you must lay him down. I cannot do it. Put him…put him somewhere warm, where I can see him. You must dig, Erik…"

I knew what she wished of me. I wished to weep.

* * *

I did not wait until morning, as I should have, but I did not want to be in the house full of sighs and worry. I labored all night, listening to the stars and the moon sing of the love they saw, of the sea that they pushed and pulled. After I had been alone for many hours, and ready to cry out in frustration at the frozen dirt, the stable master came out with me, and as silently as he had appeared, he began to turn the earth as well.

I had been very careful in the manner I had made the tiny, tiny coffin, for if I do not know how to make a proper coffin, then who would? Sophie had quietly, kindly lined it with batting from a white lamb, so it looked as if a cloud were waiting to carry him back to the heavens.

I turned my head away as Sophie arranged his tiny limbs, swallowed up in the antique white gown she had dressed him in, and placed a kiss upon his turned up nose. Silent tears streamed down her face as I placed the lid, and began to hammer with swift, sure strokes.

* * *

"I know that Christine would have wished for you to be called….after your father, but I will forever think of you as Shalem, the sunrise. You were golden and perfect, like Christine, who was born of the sun. Your father…he was good, good in the way that a spring rain is good for the earth, but he was not the angel that your mother is. You are the sunrise, for your coming has made the sun rise on a number of things, some too grand for you to understand, others too terrible to be kept by anyone but me.

"When you meet your father, tell him that I honored you as best I knew how, and though Death may be watching over his beloved, Erik shall not let her come to harm.

"It is enough."

I turned my back away from the pile of dirt that rose from the snow.


	19. Chapter 19

Everything passed so terribly slowly.

The days that Christine spent in a stupored sleep from the collection of herbs and morphine I had given her were torturous. I did not leave my quarters, for I was afraid to unleash the demons that had beset me into the rest of the house.

Time had no meaning, nor did reason, for I wallowed in hate and self-loathing, persecuted by all that I had killed, all that I had loved.

_"Send her to the Punjab lasso, Erik,"_ she Sultana commanded, laughing. _"Send her to the torture chamber as she will not please you!"_

_"Oh, Erik, what have you done?"_ the daroga asked when he saw how Christine lay, bleeding and mindless.

"I have done nothing! I have done everything, and yet still I mourn the loss of my beloved!" I shrieked.

_"No, Erik, you mustn't ask me for kisses! If I look upon your face, I shall never be free!"_

_"Erik, you said that you would leave us be, just let her go. I love her--does that mean nothing? Have you no pity? Have you no compassion?"_

"No! She is mine, mine to have as the world has given me nothing but pain!" I cried.

_"Oh, Angel of Music! Come to me, enter here at last!"_ Oh, Christine, to love and be loved like this…

"Oh, Christine! Damn you, you curious little wench! Damn you, curse your name and your infernal curiosity!"

_"Track down this murderer! We must find him!"_

I must let her go, let her go to be mine, to be free. Let her go, Erik, let her fly far, far away…Let her fly away with your heart, fly away with your songs…

_"Come, Raoul, we are safe upon the roof! His eyes are never there, as he is bashing away at his organ!"_

_"Oh, Christine, how I love you! Let me lead you from here, from your pain and loneliness!"_

_"Oh, Raoul! If only you would be my summertime, I would give you my lips now and forever!"_

"No, Christine, if you give your heart here, on Earth, it shall never be mine, and I cannot give you all that I am!"

_"Oh, why, my love, why? Who would do this, oh, my Ubaldo!"_

"I killed him, I enjoyed strangling him and I'd do it a thousand times over just to silence both of you! He was no Don Juan, not as I am! I am far more handsome than he is!"

And still, the madness rages on.

* * *

"Oh, Erik. Everything is broken now." The tears that fell from her eyes were sweet, and from them a thousand rivers sprang. "How shall I ever be whole again?"

"I do not know, angel mine. Sorrow doesn't ever leave, but it fades until it is a whisper at the back of your mind, always present."

The three days that she spent in her drugged wonderland had come and gone, finding each with me sitting by her bed like the obedient mutt that I am, my fingers steepled beneath my chin. "You should finish eating," I continued. She gave a cursory glance to the soup that Sophie had carefully made from a deer that the stable master had shot. "Venison will do you good."

"I care not for food, Erik, nor drink. It matters for naught anymore," she said quietly, her tears falling onto her folded hands.

"Angels should not weep, my dear," I said as I stood from the Louis Philippe chair. "Come. Make yourself decent, and I shall help you down to the library. It is warmer down there."

* * *

And so the winter days passed, one piling on top of the other until they had no meaning, no ending, no beginning. Each night found Christine and I chased by the cold to the library, whose book-lined walls kept the chill at bay.

While my restless mind poured through volumes of books, Christine would lay back upon the chase lounge, her legs curled beneath her, golden curls luminescent in the firelight. She would not speak, and the only sound to be heard was my pen scratching across paper as I copied words and designs.

"Erik," she said once, so softly that I thought it had only been a hopeful figment of my imagination. "Erik," she said again, her eyes staring into the fire. "How do you live with it? How do you keep all of the sorrow inside, this hurricane of misery?"

"I do not live, Madame, for I am Death."

"No. You are not Death--he has better taste in clothing," she quipped.

"Perhaps, sweet, it has happened that you have tasted the misery that Erik has felt for his whole life. Perhaps you now understand why I must be what I am."

Nothing more was said.

* * *

Spring was slow in coming; the world, it seemed, slept beneath a pristine blanket of snow.

Her heart was likewise frozen, a large wall of ice encasing it. My mounting frustration shown through the music I wrote, and within the same night, burned. I dare not touch the violin that I had so carefully picked out after senselessly dashing my other one to bits. I wished for some project, some whimsical contraption to bang on for hours on end.

So I purchased a large black piano that shown like obsidian. I shoved every piece of furniture out of the library into the hall, save the chase lounge, leaving it for the staff to decide what to do with. I had an objective in my mind, the path from myself and my destination bright and unobstructed--all other things were simply nuisances that needed brushing from the path.

Our nights, and our days, were now filled with my tormented bashing at the piano, the keys ringing out pure and true. I had chosen this particular instrument as I had adored the color, and the trueness of the notes that it produced was fabulous. I missed my organ on days that I was filled with hatred and fire, but on the rare nights that I could see nothing but Christine's honeyed skin and amber hair tumbling over her shoulders like a golden waterfall, I stroked and slid across the ivory keys, like a patient lover, filling the air with angst and the purest sort of love.

She would never allow her eyes to meet mine on those nights, but rather would bow her head low, and let the tears flow freely. She wept endlessly, and I wished to baptize myself in the salt of her pain.

Spring was many, many weeks away.

* * *

"Come, Christine. Come to me."

She did not speak, nor did she take my offered hand. Her eyes met mine, her very fine eyes, and she sat next to me on the padded bench. I took her wrists in my fingers that knew so much, and ignored her flinch. I placed her hands upon the keys, carefully arranging her fingers just so, and showed her how to make chords.

Still, she did not speak.

I gently, oh, so gently, rested my fingers atop hers, and began to press lightly, provoking a whisper of sound, and she did not pull away, nor did she quiver with fear. "Play, my dear, my tormented sweet," I said to her. "Tell me a story."

She shook her head violently, burying her face in her hands. "Tell Erik," I murmured. "Tell me what it is that you need, and I shall do it, tell me what you want, and you shall have it, but if you do not tell me, you sorrowful woman, I shall rend it from you in a most uncomfortable manner!" I shouted, my voice rising in an angry crescendo. I grasped her shoulders then, (how thin they had become!) and shook her slightly, wishing to rattle her teeth. "Tell me now! What do you need to end this flood of unhappiness that continues to wash over you!"

The impact of her forehead on my chest was surprising and sudden, so much that I nearly fell backward onto the opulent rug. "Oh, Erik!" she cried. "Oh, Erik," she sobbed again and again, gripping my shirtfront in her tiny fists, as if there were a mighty whirlpool loose inside her that would take her away lest she let go. I carefully, so slowly, wrapped my arms about her heaving back, not daring to believe that I held her pressed tightly against me, not daring to hope that I was awake, and not the victim of a torturously lucid dream. "Oh, I have needed nothing more than to be held as a child, as a mother holds a babe when she wakes from a bad dream!"

"Darling one, sweet child, taste my tears as I once did yours, and become whole as they become your own as they wash over your face. Taste their sweetness, and their bitterness, as I have waited long, long days and nights simply to give them to you."

"Erik...did I kill him? Did my happiness, my joy kill him? Was I unfaithful, and I was punished for it?" Her head tilted up, eyes wide and weeping waterfalls.

"I don't know."

She wept a gray sunrise, and a blazing noon, and a gentle evening, and we stirred not till the stars shown again.

_"Oh, Raoul! If only you would be my summertime, I would give you my lips now and forever!"_


	20. Chapter 20

Everything was becoming so horribly unbearable. What little desire I had for sleep, vanished. I longed for a release for this indefinable tension that gripped my spine and shook my resolve. Cracks were beginning to appear in my splendid arrogance, weakened by the only creature I had ever loved wallowing before me in misery.

Oh, but she had touched me. Still more amazing, she had clung to me, clung to me as one does to a lover in the midst of a gale. I had been the crystal vase that she had poured her misery into, and I swallowed every drop, burying it with all of life's other pains.

She wept no more.

She had not protested when after many long hours of her uncontrollable sobbing, I had laid her back, gently, so that I cradled her against my chest, and I carried her through the house as if she were lifeless.

Her warmth had nearly undone me. She grew heated as her tears spilled across me, and I feared her skin would burn me if I gripped her too long, and yet, I wished for nothing more than to dig my fingers brutally into her hips, to hear her whine and whimper for mercy.

Poor little darling. Had she known the thoughts that ran in rampant circles through my head, she may have thought twice about bringing her body so near to mine. I wished to coddle her, and to throttle her. I wanted to stroke her hair, and to pull on it madly until her eyes popped wide in shock. My pulse galloped and skipped through my veins, tempered one moment, thrumming with desire the next.

Neither of us slept at night anymore, silence covering us like a woolen blanket, muffling all noise from morning to night. While the stars danced across the sky, Christine paced the hall in bare feet. To and fro, back and forth, metered even steps that were beginning to be the same rhythmic throbs of my desire. I burned like the most eternal candle. Her misery was a quandary, my desire, my torture. It was blissful the way that she had taken to walking across the wooden floors; my waistcoat and trousers became a tangled jumble as I writhed across the floor, the lust in my veins tearing out of control.

I was an ember cast off from the hearth, left to burn on my own, crying, dying for my own fantasies. I knew damn well that I was mad, but there was such joy to be had in the depths of Hell.

******************

Christine.

What had I become? Was this Don Juan, this pitiful man who had shed hours of tears for the simple joy of feeling her draw breath against him?

Oh, but it had been sweet. She had bathed me in the salt of her misery, and I had withstood the flood of emotions. My own duality shocked and shook me down to the very core of my being--I existed merely to be near her endlessly, fetching a million little things for her during the day, simply so I could look upon her sharp angles and gentle curves that swooped over her body. I wished to wallow in her blood, to taste it as it filled my mouth, and I would die in happiness if I could do nothing more than tend to her wounds for the rest of my life, to ensure her wholeness.

My madness was deafening, reducing all sounds around me to a meaningless hum. I heard no one speak, as Christine was silent, and all other sounds were unworthy of being noted. I had to drum upon the keys just to break the barrier in my mind.

She wept no more.

***************

"Christine Daae...Christine Daae, I hear your sorrow. Christine Daae, I am the voice given to your angst."

"No tricks, Erik. I cannot see you, but I know that is you. I'd know your golden throat anywhere."

Ah, clever girl. She had not so much as stirred from her perch on the bed, leaned against the headboard. The small prayer book she held delicately in her hands wavered not, or did her gaze.

"Christine Daae, come to me, for I am the snow upon the ground, and the wind through the branches. I am winter and I am forged of the tears of young maidens. Come, and bask in my glory."

"Oh, Erik, it is too cold, and the sun has gone. I have no patience for your silly rhymes and stories," she huffed, pushing her chin out defiantly.

"Christine Daae, wrap yourself in the comfort that Erik has given you, shelter yourself in the warmth of the magnificent gift I have given you."

"A gift?" she queried, her eyebrows rising in interest.

"An offering for the Goddess of Song, for the song upon my violin strings."

She stepped delicately onto the cold floor, not bothering with any coverings for her feet, simply wrinkling her nose in distaste. She pulled her robe tightly about her, thin though as it was, and scooted to the wardrobe. She pulled it open cautiously, as if she expected a cobra to leap out at her, and gasped in surprise. A lone black fur hung squarely in the middle, lustrous and shining in the shape of a hooded cloak.

"Oh...oh!" she cried. "It is simply divine!" She pulled it forth, running an appreciative hand over the expanse of the smooth pelt. "I have never seen anything like it. Oh, Erik, why would you do something like this?"

She slid the heavy garment around her shoulders, sighing in delight at the deep purple satin lining that slipped so deliciously over her skin. Her girlish charm had resurfaced, if only for a moment, and it made my mouth tug into a smile.

"Now come, my darling. Make yourself ready, for your angel is waiting for you."

*****************

"Erik, I cannot see," she protested, her fingers clasped tightly around my wrists. "It is not as if this is some grand thing that I have never seen before."

"Oh, but it is, Christine." I carefully felt my way behind me with my toes before placing my foot down, carefully, and picked my way over a stone. "Lift your foot higher, dear, and just a bit farther. There, now, be good and stand still for a moment--Erik cannot feel his hands." She shifted nervously, leaning from foot to foot, the pristine snow crunching beneath her boots.

Pristine snow. Pristine Christine. I adored irony.

"There's a good girl. The moon is jolly high tonight, so you should be able to see for quite some distance."

"What am I seeing, Erik, besides that I will have to have my toes removed from the cold?"

"Your soul," I whispered into her ear, gently sliding the scarf from her eyes, and letting it fall to the snow, pooling like blood at our feet.

Her cry of delight at the snow-covered meadow was sublime. She clasped both hands in front of her chest, like a young girl, and stood on her tip toes. She swayed backward slightly, and I came to stand behind her, so close that I could feel the heat coming from her body, the faint brush of fur against my cloak.

"It is...it must be magical! I have never seen so many stars, or the moon, so high. The Earth must be higher here, closer to her sister moon," she murmured. She tipped her head back so that she could better see the heavenly orbs above, resting her head on my chest. I, however, closed my eyes, and gripped her arms tightly lest I forget myself and lay siege to her beautiful neck.

Did she know that I dreamt of that part of her body more than any other? It is true. It would be a fine thing to lift the heaviness of her hair away from her skin, to feel the heat on my face, to inhale the scent trapped there. I desired to feel her pulse throbbing beneath my long fingers, to feel her throat hum as she sang, to watch her enjoy the feel of the luxurious fur against her naked skin with nothing betwixt.

But that was neither here, nor there.

"Do you understand, Christine? Do you know why I have brought you here, to this beautiful place made of ice and shadows?" I said.

"No," she whispered, her breath freezing before her.

"It is to teach you, young one, to teach you as I always have. This lesson has naught to do with golden notes, or blood paid for love. This is a most personal sort of lesson, the kind that you must learn to survive.

"You see, Christine Daae, you are the winter. You have become all things frozen and sorrowful. Your eyes are the terrible winter sky, your tears the snow that falls onto all of the living things. You have become a creature of misery, of unending pain."

"Oh? And how would you know this, wise Maestro?"

"Because," I said, turning her so that she looked up at me with bitter eyes. "Because I am you, and you are me; we are the same, save you have your pretty face and a bit of your sanity left. We both are as pieces of paper that have been folded and creased through the middle by agony, in which nothing from before will ever flow into the latter."

"You believe this to be true? You believe that we are the same?" she asked, her voice belying her irritation.

"I know it, darling one. I can see it in the way that you walk, in the way you have distaste for all those who would take pity at your misery, in the very way that you draw breath," I said, pushing closer to her, so close that I could feel her small pants through her mouth. "Let us pretend, for a moment, that we are one in the same person. Let us make believe that we are both children of darkness, doomed forever to be alone, yet together as one," I said, leaning over her.

"Oh, Erik," she laughed. "Don't you know that you could be anyone, absolutely anyone with that mask? Do you not know that you could be whoever I wished you to be?"

"And who would you wish for me to be? Your dear father? Or perhaps the dear Viscount, now deceased. Would you like for me to be your own personal Adonis, with golden hair and skin like the sunshine? Would it make you happy if I had his striking features and his proud stride? Would that please you, Christine Daae?" I spat, squeezing the upper portion of her arms, certain that I would leave bruises, black and blue fingers upon her skin. The very thought of it caused a distinct heat to pool in my lower belly.

"No, for as much as you try, you shall never be him, you wretch. You shall never be honorable, or chivalrous, or benevolent. You shall always be Erik, the Phantom of the Opera, the ghost, the shade, the corpse who can sing like an angel. You will always be the man who tricked a naive young girl into thinking that you were a divine being, when you were a creature of the Underworld," she said, not bothering to try and twist free, but rather, she pressed herself closer to me, making my eyes flash. "You shall never be anything but Erik...and that is all that I want you to be."

"Be careful, Christine, for you have entered uncharted waters, and it could be very easy to drown," I said as she placed her hands gently on my chest. "Do not begin what you do not intend to finish."

"Do shut up, Erik. You speak far too often and far too long about nothing. I am a grown woman of four and twenty, and I do believe that I know what I am doing by now. I am so terribly lonely being locked in my house with nothing more than a maid and a ghost to keep me company. I wish to have a companion, a mate to amuse me in the morning and to take me on a drive on Sundays," she said wistfully.

"Perhaps," I began, daring to hope, allowing the lust that I had kept hidden for so dreadfully long to seep out. My own respirations began to accelerate, and for the first time in a great long while, I was not chilled, within or without my brain. "Perhaps, we could finish what we started. We both hold the same desires in our hearts, and my love for you is eternal and undying. I could make you happy, Christine. Not content, and never whole, but happy enough."

"But could you live with me forever knowing that I do not love you and that I will never love you as I did Raoul? Can you live with that terrible truth, Erik?"

"Yes. I have given you my soul, and still you ask if I can endure even more of your torture? Laden me with your troubles, heap your abuses upon me, and do every terrible thing that you can think of that would possibly bring you any joy. I ask only that you allow me to bask in the light of your company, and perhaps allow me to kiss your hand every once and again," I hissed, holding her tightly.

"Very well, then. As long as you have dedicated your entire existence to my happiness, I have a request of you. I wish for you to sing for me, to sing with your bewitching voice, and to carry me far, far from here as often as I wish. I want to drift with you on your river of madness," she said, breaking free and dancing away, slipping on the snow.

I let my eyes fall closed.

And I opened my throat, and let the dream begin.


	21. Chapter 21

**AN: Hello, lovelies. Thank you for sticking with me through this. There are only a few more chapters to go, and then it's off I go to work on _The Magician's Prison_ again, and to also start churning things out for my latest Smut For Relief Campaign. Why, you don't know what that last bit is? Hop on over to my profile for a looky-loo, won't you?**

**A humongous cupcake-laden thank you to everyone who has reviewed!**

We drifted endlessly in a world composed only of my songs and her whimsies. I made her food tell lewd jokes, played countless songs that mad her smile, and created entire universes with my music. My voice was in her ear without fail, always whispering, sining, comforting. I feared to be without her, so I kept her on a leash made of my voice, beckoning her to me at all times.

Sophie said nothing, just watched i careful silence as I allowed her mistress to float upon my creations, buoyed by my own insanity. But she saw that Christine smiled quite sadly, so she was quiet.

I, however, was quite furious at myself, reduced to being the plaything of a woman that held me on a rope of her own. I had allowed myself to be reduced to a pile of simpering man, not even a man, for I had traded my dignity for time spent with her.

Bought and sold, traded and told.

This simply would not do. I had to find where precisely I had dropped my pride, my ability to seduce and use without reservation, and retrieve it. Ah, yes. The answer was in Don Juan.

******************

"Fire courses through the veins,

Falling like the summer rains;

Come to me, Oh desirous one,

To the man who holds the sun..."

Her hands began to twitch, and she sighed softly in response to my voice pouring through the walls. She was sprawled across the great bed, her hair spread out above her like a fan.

"Come, and taste of lust,

Come, it is I you trust;

I am the dawn you seek,

Be you neither shy nor meek…"

Her hands came alive in a slow dance, reaching up to place them gently over her throat, fingers splayed. Oh, what new pleasure was this? I groaned softly, warm, stiff. I spoke now in melody only, my palms drumming quietly on the boards that supported me, tribal. Everything seemed to fall under a red light, following the same rhythm, endless.

Her voice. I needed to hear her sing, to hear that gilded thing that I had tuned and perfected like a beloved instrument.

"Sing, goddess of mine,

Sing, my heart is thine…"

"Sing, Christine Daae. Sing, as though you were the first to ever see the sun rise after the night."

The air was suddenly thick and heavy, pressing in from all sides; I struggled to breathe. I wriggled, twisted, trying to find a way to unhinge my pent up joints, but I was held fast by the boards above and below me.

A small sigh floated up between the slats, followed by a quiet hum. Christine's eyes were pressed tightly closed, and a series of various small notes emanated from her throat, not entirely at random, but as if she were experimenting, testing her voice. The sound rang with remarkable clarity, but also held the tell-tale signs that it had not been used as such for quite some time.

I allowed my own wolf's eyes to drift shut, and my voice began to spring to life of its own accord, caressing, stroking across her soft skin, daring to touch where I did not. She exhaled slowly through her nose, and lifted on leg, bent at the knee, exposing white flesh from the folds of her robe. I could see water still clinging to her from her bath, making her skin sparkle. Her sternum began to rise and fall more rapidly, her mouth falling open into gentle pants.

Her tiny noises continued, not singing, per se, but pushing and prodding non the less. I changed my pitch, sped the tempo, and she responded by pulling aimlessly at the ties that held her robe cinched at he waist. Her fingers struggled, not entirely obeying her wishes, and her brow furrowed in frustration.

Her moan of triumph made one side of my mouth tug upward. She struggled for a moment, then purred happily as she pushed the garment apart slightly, exposing her abdomen and the very edges of the slopes of her breasts. Her hands slid down her torso, coming to rest on her stomach, palms flat.

Her body was bowed, arching upward like a harp, and I plucked and caressed her as such, my voice wrapping around her, sliding, loving.

No.

Something was not right, and I wasn't entirely sure what. My eyes seemed to be telling my brain something, but I as distracted by my being masterful and seductive, heaving white flesh below me, lust floating through the air.

_Can't you see? Do you not see what is wrong with her?_

No. Tell me.

_Look, you fool! Is Don Juan blind or simple?_

Don Juan is brilliant--Erik, now, Erik is not so quick on the uptake.

My eyes popped open, focused, then fell shut in pain.

"Oh, my dear," I whispered, allowing the song to falter and break. she was so thin. Her ribs were clearly visible beneath her pallid skin, her belly sunk inward, and her fingers were so delicate that they appeared as if they would snap quite easily.

How had I allowed this to happen? I was supposed to be her companion, her protector and obedient servant. Had I caused this? Had all my subtle whispering sand gentle prodding with songs been too much for her already fragile state of mind? She had submitted so easily, so willingly that I had thought myself fortunate. I was truly a great ass.

Christine made a miniscule noise behind her lips, a "Hmph!" at the sudden silence that fell on her ears. I could not leave her like this, entranced and sweating, delirious with desire and song. I parted my lips, and began to sing again, but this time, she sighed like a young child, and her limbs that were flung out so carelessly began to curl as she folded into a knot.

I would have smiled at her content little snores, but my heart had sunk to the depths of my bowels, settling like an unfortunate stone. My own muscles were coiled tightly, my back humped like a cat. I dare not to sleep, as I wished to stand guard over her at all times; each time she began to stir, I would resume my low lullaby that reverberated in my chest.

She did not wake till morning next.

* * *

"Come in, Erik," Christine called through the heavy mahogany door. I bowed my head, my chin tucked to my chest in submission. I covered the space between the threshold and her four-poster bed in four strides of my long legs, but I dared not to look at her innocent face. I settled into the Louis-Philippe chair that sat next to her bed. "What is it that you want?" she continued.

I maintained my silence until Sophie had finished fussing over her, fluffing her pillows just so, and pulling the blankets up to her arms. Sophie threw an accusing glance at me, as if to ask if I had see the poor state that he mistress was in. Her condition was exceedingly worse by the light of the noon-day sun; dark circles hung below her eyes, and her hair had begun to lose its sheen.

I wet my lips nervously, my hands twitching, longing for something to toy with. I nodded slightly to Sophie. Yes. I knew.

And I would like very much to cut out my vocal cords for using them in such a way.

Sophie lifted her head then, and her upper lip curled slightly in distaste as she shuffled to the door. I breathed deeply, then hissed it out across my teeth. Christine sat up expectantly, her eyebrows lifting in a silent question.

"Christine, you know that I am loyal to you, loyal like a dog to its master, and I have no other wish than to serve you as such. But…but I am also a man, and I have been so lonely for so terribly long. Do you know what it is like to live in shadows and darkness your entire life? To have no one ever touch you without quivering with fear?" I sighed then, long and heavy. Her brow dropped into her eyes, confused, but rapt.

"I believe I have done you a terrible wrong."

The whole pathetic truth came pouring from me then, as if my very soul had been stabbed and I bled pity and guilt. She said nothing, simply stared in dismayed silence.

"You are truly a horrible man," she said slowly when I had finished. "You are not even a man; you are the putrid offal of a snake. Who are you to use that golden throat of yours to bend me to your will? You are quite awful, and you have not changed at all. I should not have hoped for anything more, you foul beast. What a great fool I was to put any sort of faith in you. Shame on me, but greater shame on you and what little pride you have for pulling me around like your own personal marionette. I have never hated someone as I do you!" she cried, then doubled over, sobbing into her hands.

I fell to the floor before her bed, my knees bent beneath me and my forehead touching floor in a reverent kow-tow. "I am yours, Christine. Lay every foul thought you have ever had onto me, and I will bear it if you desire it! Give me your every wish and I will sell my very soul to make it happen! I only wished to do as you said, to make you dream, but Erik is so weak! I tried only to please you, to do as you asked!"

"Do you truly believe that it matters? Do you think that I will ever forget Raoul, or my father, or my pretty mother? Do you think that they mean so little to me that I would turn my back on every decent thing they taught me just so I could indulge your fantasy to serve me, so that I would come to love you? No," she continued, "I do not believe that it matters what you do, Erik, because no one really gives a damn."

One tear pattered onto the rich floor, and then another, and two more. I had betrayed the only woman I dared to love, bought and sold, traded and told, all for the price of my own damnable libido and loneliness.

*****************

"I have brought you something special for dinner, Madame," I said with a stiff bow. She thrust her jaw out, and refused to look at me. "I believe that you have a penchant for Italian cuisine, yes?"

"Yes. Thank you," she said quietly. I gently placed the tray on the writing desk shoved against the wall, bowed again, and slinked silently away.

I had become nothing more than the shadow I had once been, speaking in polite tones when the occasion called for it, never singing, never lovingly placing my fingers on any of my instruments. My fingers felt dead and useless, my brain silent. A constant buzzing filled my ears, like a thousand bees, droning over all other noises so that I couldn't hear when I was addressed. My guilt had become my end, the solitude ravaging over me. Her grief and betrayal was going to be my end.

* * *

"I must leave for a while; you will be on your own for a time. Can you amuse yourself until I return?"

"I believe I can," she sniffed. Her disdain turned to curiosity. "Where are you going?"

"I must fetch some things that I left in my flight north to come to you. I miss my possessions and my treasures. I must take the carriage, and the stable master if that is agreeable to you--the boy shall stay, and you shall have Delilah and the phaeton, should you need it."

"Yes. Fine."

No wishes for a safe return, or a pleasurable journey. No questions as to why I felt that I needed to retrieve my abandoned things. I had opened a rift between us, and I did not know if I could forge a bridge wide enough to span her distaste for me. Alas, what should I have assumed, that she would gather a ghost close to her heart?

* * *

There was no room left in the carriage or on the luggage rack on the top by the time I had finished loading it with all manner of trunks and boxes. Of course, this meant that I would have to hold the most precious gift close to me while I rode before the carriage.

I did not take into account the great difficulty that would present itself in trying to keep the wriggling ball of fur both warm and still. I dropped the reins more than once, and Exodus would snort and seize the bit between his great teeth, leaping ahead in great bounds. I finally gave in and tucked the fuzzy creature into my vest and buttoned my waistcoat around it. It promptly fell asleep.

I, however, was filled with immense trepidation at my return. How would I be greeted? Would she have fled while I was gone? Around and around my brain circled in a cycle of doom and hope.

* * *

"Good evening, Christine," I murmured as I bowed.

"Hello, Erik," she replied softly, the candle light illuminating her skin so that it glowed orange.

"I have brought you many presents from Paris," I announced, and pulled a large trunk into the bedroom.

"Erik," she began to protest, but I silenced her with a flick of my index finger. I pulled open the lid, flinging the clasps aside casually. I reached in for the first item.

"I know the importance of allowing all that ails your heart and soul and troubles your mind to escape; but, as you refuse to use your God-given treasure, I thought that perhaps your hands could translate," I said as I handed her a leather-bound journal. She said nothing, but ran her fingers across the supple surface.

"I know that it is past the season, but I do believe that I neglected to give you a proper Christmas present," I continued, and placed a wad of tissue wrapping into her hands. She pulled off the paper, and delicately held a glass butterfly meant to be hung on a Christmas tree.

"Oh!" she gasped, and dangled it over her head so that it caught the light.

"I also brought wonderful Parisian foods for us to dine one, enough to satisfy even the most persnickety of appetites." I lifted several boxes of tarts and other pastries for her to examine, as well as a couple bags of hard candies. "Sophie has taken the steaks and other things and placed them in the snow to keep them."

"Erik, this is all very considerate, but it does not excuse--"

"I have not finished!" I continued. "I have been saving the best for last." I turned to the door and stepped into the hall; Sophie handed me the little creature, which I buried in the folds of my cloak. "I know that your heart is full of warmth and kindness, for I have glimpsed this myself--who else could pity a monster?" She blinked several times. "But that is not the point. I believe that you need something to fill that horrible gap that has been torn into your very being, something to pour all of your maternal instincts and kindness into."

"I do not think that--"

"Here!" I interrupted, withdrawing the twisting little thing, and dropped it unceremoniously in her lap.

"Oh…Oh, Erik! He is beautiful!" she exclaimed as she scooped up the yellow puppy, and held him close, breathing in the smell of his warm fuzz. "Where did you find him? He's so wonderful! And…" She touched the red ribbon tied around his neck, and slid a sly look to me. "Did you do this, Erik? I thought you detested dogs."

"I do. I have little use for something that bounds about incessantly and insists on slobbering on everything that it comes into contact with. This one, however, was an orphan, abandoned on the Rue Scribe, so I took him into my arms and washed him. I had originally thought that he was brown, he was so coated with filth. Imagine my delight when I realized that he matched the very hue that cascaded down my beloved's back!" A sound reverberated from deep within my belly, causing both of us to start.

I was laughing.

Christine's smile fell a little, leaving her eyes. "I do not believe that I have ever heard you laugh in happiness. I remember the ghastly sound of your laughter echoing around the stage, and the chandelier…" Her voice trailed off, leaving me full of still more guilt.

"There is one more parcel for you to open," I said softly, pulling out a large box wrapped with white paper and tied with a green ribbon. She set the puppy down carefully, and took the box with a look full of suspicion and mistrust.

She carefully pulled the ribbon off and hesitated for a moment before pulling the lid off. She said nothing, merely sat perfectly still for as instant, frozen. She began to speak, then maintained her silence. Her hand reached out, tentative, and gently stroked the deep blue satin.

With one swift motion, she shook the dress out of the box, a soft noise passing her lips. "I've never seen anything so, so beautiful. It looks like someone made a sapphire into fabric and…" her eyes narrowed, and she sneered at me, accusing. "I suppose that now you'll demand that I join you for dinner, and I wear this dress? You are dreadfully mistaken if you believe that I will endure another meal with you staring at me while I pick at my food."

"No," I said, feeling low. "No, I do not expect anything from you. I merely wished to demonstrate that I can can be kind--I am not made simply of bad intentions and selfishness. I had hoped once to shower you with gifts every day, to give anything for you to be happy. I forgot myself, and I wish for you to forgive me. I am full of regret for using my voice against you; I will never do so again.

"I only wish for us to live in peace, to maybe try and live as other people do. I wish to be a normal man."

"You still do not understand, do you Erik?" she said, her pout fading. "You shall never be able to live as the rest of humanity does because you do not number yourself with the rest of us. You cannot expect to be accepted if you do not cease this idea that you do not have to behave like a 'normal' man," she said angrily.

"Oh, my dear Christine, it is quite more complicated than that! Far more!"

"No, it isn't," she muttered quietly as the door clicked shut.

* * *

The smells that permeated the air were rich and indulgent, pungent. Although I did not eat very often, I simply loved to cook. The very idea of crafting a scrumptious meal from raw materials fascinated me. I liberally sprinkled the sizzling meat with spices that were dark and foreign, not from any French market, but brought from the lands to the east.

A minute noise, from the doorway…

"It smells wonderful, Erik," Christine said softly. I spared her a passing glance, and then turned to stare at her fully. She was dressed for the first time in many weeks, looking as if she had been born and bred into the rich countryside. She wore a dark green vest that corseted down the front over a white shirt and matching skirts that appeared to be made from some natural fiber.

I gave her a courteous bow, feeling a bit silly and naked in only my shirt and trousers. "I have always had a fondness for all things culinary," I confessed. "I take special pleasure in the confection of meats and all manner of sauces."

She came closer and peeked into a bowl beneath a small piece of cheese cloth. "I have always loved making bread," she said. "It seems almost magical the way the yeast comes alive and makes the dough rise. May I?" she asked, one dainty eyebrow arched.

I nodded briskly, secretly watching her every move form the corner of my eye. She unceremoniously poured the risen dough fro the bowl onto the counter sprinkled with flour and began folding it over and pushing into it, her small fingers disappearing.

"I am glad you have come."

"I am as well."

* * *

We said nothing, but volumes were spoken in the simple silence, from the way she smiled with one side of her mouth as she ate, to our comfort in the casual dress. I was filled with joy at the sight of Christine eating heartily, pausing only to savor the Tokay wine.

Memories threatened to shove their way into my consciousness; I had only to close my eyes and I could see Christine sitting across form me at a very different table, one carved lovingly of rough-hewn wood, years lifted from her face. She had been wearing her dressing gown over her costume, and was picking carefully at her prawns so as not to drop anything on her bejeweled dress.

I could only stare at her, still exquisite, but the sadness etched across her face in lines that appeared in the corners of her eyes. Gone was the youthful exuberance, and her feminine manners, replaced by only a sense of being, all pretentiousness gone.

"I have never seen you without your waistcoat and jacket before," she said suddenly, pulling me from my reverie. "It is a refreshing to not have to feel as if I must be on my best behavior," she said impishly.

"I have likewise never seen you looking so informal, and yet, so at home."

"You make me so very nervous when you just stare at me like that, Erik," she announced. "It seems strange that you would go to all the trouble of preparing this divine food, and not even taste it."

"It was no trouble; anything done for you could never be a chore," said lowly, causing Christine's cheeks to flush pink. "In truth, I find more pleasure in the creation of the meal than the actual consumption."

"Why do you desire me so much? What drives you to seek out my company when I have done nothing but despise you?"

My mind temporarily froze at her query; how do you explain true love? How could I possibly form the proper words and phrases to convey joy, and sadness, and happiness?

"It is because when I first stared into those cerulean eyes, my soul felt the shock of recognition at the sadness in you. I could see your immense passion, and more importantly, your deep respect for music. I could almost taste your joy at hearing my voice. I loved you from the moment I saw you--I still do. I have come to the realization that you shall never return this great emotion that I have for you, but it is enough for me to be allowed to layer you with kindness and to bask in your presence."

Christine found her folded hands immensely fascinating, her white teeth flashing as she bit her lip. She was silent, so very silent, and I feared that I had crossed a boundary of some sort. She began to rise, either to leave or for some other purpose, I'll never know, for a familiar ringing pierced the air.

"That sounds just like the Rue Scribe bell," she whispered, then turned to gaze at me accusingly as it rang again. "You have made some sort of warning device, haven't you?"

"Yes," I said smoothly. "I would not want to be taken by surprise." She opened her mouth to utter some scathing remark, but she was cut off by the unmistakable and alarming sound of someone pounding on the great wooden door, and shouting her name.


	22. Chapter 22

The two inspectors that had shuffled through the main hall and into the sitting room were both portly, their faces red either from the brisk wind or inebriation. Christine's back was unnaturally straight as she beckoned them to sit close to the fire; I could feel the nervousness rolling off her in waves.

"Madame, I truly hate to disrupt you, but I fear that it is a matter of grave importance," said the first one, a man with graying temples and a mustache.

"You see, we are rarely summoned this far into the countryside for trivial matters, but upon further consideration, we deemed this occasion to be quite significant," his companion continued. His spectacles reflected the firelight, disguising the wrinkles in the corners of his eyes that suggested that he smiled frequently. "Your maiden name was Daae, was it not?"

Christine nodded as Sophie came scurrying into the room with a silver tea service. "Yes, it was. My father was Swedish."

"Ah. Very good, very good," the older one commented, taking a note. "And were you not once a soprano at the Palais Garnier?"

"Yes, monsieur, I was."

"Please, Madame, Jacques will do. We have on file some rather…disturbing testimony from that period of time in which you resided in the dormitories there. Was it not true that you vanished for a time of three weeks?"

"Yes. I did," she said softly, her eyes falling, her posture breaking.

"Can you tell us how that came to be?"

"No," she said, shaking her head, "for I do not truly understand it myself."

"Can you tell us where you were?"

"No."

"Can you tell us who held you captive?"

"No."

"Do you know how it came to be that Count Philippe's body came to be found on the shores of the underground lake?"

"He fell," she murmured. "He came to save his brother from what he deemed to be his own madness, and he fell into the lake."

_"Oh, him? Why, my dear daroga, he fell into the lake quite clumsily! It was not I!"_

"I see." They exchanged a glance between them, conveying their doubts and disbelief.

My arms had locked into steel bands from where I hid above them. I am certain that if they could have felt the heat of my gaze, they would have died then and there, twisting and burning in agony. At the same moment as my blood began to run hot, my mind grew quite cold, frighteningly logical, leaping to solutions before the problem was present.

"Monsieurs, if I may ask, what is the purpose of these inquiries? My husband and I fled to the north so that we may be free from all of that suspicion and accusation," Christine pouted.

They hesitated before answering, pulling air in and holding it. "It would seem, my dear, that a man matching the description of the one who seemed to be the source of so much trouble and bloodshed has been seen fleeing to this part of the country on a large black horse."

"We dismissed this, of course, as the ravings of superstitious country-folk," Jacques continued, "that is, until we heard word from a midwife who is fairly well respected in this part of the world, that a man with features like Death and yellow eyes that burned had threatened her in this very house!" They both leaned forward expectantly.

I did not have the Punjab lasso tucked into its place in my sleeve, but I did not need it for only two men. I knew well enough how to kill a man with my hands. I felt a pang for a moment as I realized that Christine would have to watch them die, but what alternative had I?

Christine, however, I must give her credit for being smarter than she allows herself to appear on the surface. She gasped in shock, then raised a hand dramatically to her breast, as if the very implication were enough to send her heart reeling.

"Monseiurs! I am certain that I have never been so insulted!" she cried. Sophie, who must have been waiting for some sort of signal, rushed into the room, and gathered Christine close, who burst into pretty tears, burying her face in her hands.

"How dare you!" Sophie scolded, and immediately the two men appeared to deflate. "My mistress has suffered enough without the dimwitted accusations of a midwife! Already this year she has lost both her dear husband--a great naval man, and her son, born to her too early, and you come bringing this…this foolishness! That midwife is an idiot who seeks to save her reputation after she has failed my lady so horribly!" They were both now cringing, seeking a place to hide amongst themselves, red creeping from their faces to their ears.

"I am plagued by rumors that have followed me from Paris," Christine wept. "Is it not enough that I have no one in this world left to me? Now I must be the recipient of this gossip born of superstition jealousy! Well," she said through her teeth, "I believe that will conclude your business here. Good day to you. Sophie, show them to the door," she said, beginning to cry again.

They nearly trampled each other in their haste the scurry out the door, tails tucked between their legs.

I began to laugh, silently, smiling behind my mask, certain now more than ever that I truly did love her. She did not even flinch as I dropped from the ceiling into a crouch before her. She wiped her tears away quickly, then stood at the same time that I rose from the floor.

"I do certainly hope you appreciate my making a fool of myself for your sake," she snipped.

"I thought your performance was delightful," I said, still grinning with one side of my face. "I always believed your acting was undermined by your voice."

* * *

Something had shifted between us, taking we two sorrowful souls from people merely sharing space to something of the dynamic of companions. Sophie, perceptive as she was, commented on it once as Christine lay lounging in her bath.

"If I may be so bold, are you terribly frightened of Erik?"

"No," Christine said slowly. "He does not terrify me as he used to. I feel…pity for him. And some measure of respect. He really is quite brilliant."

"He wears that mask to cover some horrible disfigurement, does he not?" Christine nodded her assent. "Yet, the one side of his face is not nearly so bad as he makes it out to be," Sophie continued quietly.

"No," Christine agreed. "If he ate a bit more and filled out his bones, his face would not be nearly so tragic."

"Tell me," Sophie said, dropping down to her knees in order to help Christine wash her hair. "What is it like to be caught in that piercing gaze of his?"

"It is like dying," she said softly. "It is like dying and being born all at once. It is frightening, but not because of his eyes; it is because of the fire that is burning within him. It is as if every pure thought that I ever held goes running from my head, only to be replaced by something that I cannot name. He burns. Still, the way that he carries himself is most impressive. He is taller than most anyone else I have ever seen, and his hands are rather fine."

Sophie had stopped soaping her hair, and was very still. Christine sighed deeply, and Sophie lifted a pitcher to rinse her hair.

I closed my eyes, and I dreamed.

* * *

My eyes opened of their own accord, my body tightening at a peculiar sound. Someone was tapping quietly on my door. I stood, cursing my joints that had stiffened as I slept, and smoothed my hair from my face. I pulled the door open forcefully, making Christine start.

My breath caught in my chest at the sight of her standing before me, her feet bare and her hair loosed about her shoulders. Her collar bones were clearly visible as her dressing gown was tied rather loosely over her nightdress.

"I know that it is late, Erik, but I wished to speak with you," she said softly as she slid past me into the room, biting her lips and twisting her sleeves. She looked like a child who has done something wrong and is awaiting punishment.

"What is it?" I said hoarsely.

"It has occurred to me that I have not always been very kind to you," she said, her eyes on the Persian carpet that I brought from my home. "In fact, I have been quite cruel, haven't I?" I said nothing, and she brought her eyes up to mine. "I wish to…apologize. I may have been misgiving to be so harsh when you have laid your heart so plainly before me. I know that you care for me so very deeply, but I fear that all that you feel for me is, well, lust, or that you simply love me for my voice."

"Is that what you believe, Christine?" I hissed, moving before her in one easy stride. "Do you truly believe that I desire only your voice? Do you not know that I live and breathe through you? Do you not know that I worship everything about you? That I live for the way that you tilt your head when you angry? That I adore the way that you hold your arms by your sides? Oh, how can I tell you that I am enthralled by the way that your neck melts so perfectly into your shoulders, all the way down to your fingertips!" I growled at her, gripping her shoulders in my long fingers.

Her body fell lax then, as if every tendon in her pretty body had been cut, and she slumped against me. Her breath panted from between her parted lips, bathing me in the fragrance of the mint that she frequently chewed. She placed her hands carefully, oh so softly, on my chest, curling into the folds of my shirt. Her head fell back so that she could regard me with hooded blue eyes that were swimming with some unnamed emotion.

"Don't speak anymore, Erik. Don't you dare to say another word, or I may fall into you and never be able to find myself. Do you know why I am so afraid of you, of your voice? Because I feat that I will lose myself in your heated tones and never be able to find my own mind again. I'm scared that I will begin to burn just as you do, and I will never be able to stop."

So I was silent, but my hands found their way to her back and pressed her close to me, one coming up to tangle in her hair and force her head to my shoulder. I buried my face into the golden mass of curls, and salted her head with my tears of pain, of sorrow, and of frustration at wanting so badly to give her all that I am, and having nothing to offer her but my being. She was likewise weeping, her small frame shuddering against my large one.

"Christine…" I whispered into her ear, and she pushed against me, insistent. I pulled her hair from one of her shoulders that were like sonnets, and placed my face close to her skin, allowing her heady scent to flow into my body.

A discernable sound escaped her, her throat humming beneath the fingers that I placed there. "Oh, Christine," I said against her skin. "You burn already. You do not know the terrible cold that has been within me, and that you have made my blood melt and my body to ache!"

"Erik, be silent. Let me cling to you, like this, as you hold me against you. Do not let go."

Something snapped within her then, and I do not know if I could name what, but she abandoned some small piece of herself, something that had been afraid and lost, and she allowed herself to simply be taken over by the waves of lust that pounded over us.

Even as she began to tumble to the floor, her body folding in half, her consciousness slipping away, I had the presence of mind to catch her, her hands still clenched tightly, tears falling from the corners of her eyes. She was still so slight, so fragile, and I was concerned about the toll her heart was taking on her body. I bore her away easily to her room, and laid her gently, as if she were wrought of glass and butterfly wings. She whimpered quietly as I detached her hands from my shirt, and pulled the blankets over her.

"Don't leave me," she moaned, so I stayed, and petted her forehead, and sat beside her bed until my head fell forward to the blankets, and stayed as sleep overtook me.

* * *

"Why are you doing this?"

"Because I wish to please you. It is also not proper that I have not bothered to court you as a lady deserves," I explained patiently, lifting her by the waist, causing her to gasp in surprise. "I wish to do kind things for you, to make you smile." She was silent, but wrinkled her nose as she settled into the carriage seat.

"I do wish that I could see; I hate it when you insist on covering my eyes like this. I will still enjoy the surprise," she protested. I laughed under my breath, pulling the door shut behind me.

"But then it will not be a surprise."

We spent the rest of the journey in measured silence, moving from dirt and rocks to cobblestone toward evening.

"We are in Paris, aren't we?" she inquired softly, her hands folded in her lap.

"Yes. How did you know?"

"The sounds, the smells…You can taste Paris before you arrive to it," she said wistfully. "I have not been here in so long…"

My heart constricted has her face fell, remembering.

* * *

"You must be very silent, and do exactly as I say," I whispered into her ear, causing gooseflesh to rise on her skin. "Hold tightly to my hand," I instructed as I stretched her right arm across my torso so that I might grasp her right hand in mine. I lifted my left arm so that my cloak draped across her shoulders and splayed my fingers across her ribs, pushing her into me. She sighed a little, and tipped her head back so that it rested very lightly on my shoulder.

"Take me where you will, Charon."

"Do not be afraid," I whisper, letting my lips brush against her.

"I'm not afraid."

We went forth, moving as one body, holding tightly to one another, my eyes finding their way in the dark, my feet moving as if I had never left. Through darkened halls, secret passes, stairs, and shadows we passed, silent ghosts that said nothing and were seen by no one.

"May I see now?"

"No, and be very silent." She huffed at my rebuke, and I cringed a bit, but I could not risk our being found.

We finally arrived at our destination, the wood beneath our feet creaking slightly. I positioned her carefully, allowing her to lean back against me.

"Now," I announced. "Now, you may see where Erik has brought you." I whipped off her blindfold easily, and she cried out in surprise and wonder.

"My God, Erik, I have never seen anything like this! Oh, I bet the Emperor himself didn't have a view as grand as this!" My mouth pulled into a mad smirk as she leaned over the proscenium of the stage, gripping me tightly, nearly eye level with the chandelier…

The chandelier…

_"Behold, she is singing to bring down the chandelier!"_

"Oh, Erik, you could see this every night?"

"Yes, I could, but I had eyes only for one young soprano who could sing to make the angels weep," I said as she turned to me, her blue eyes wide with sympathy and some other emotion that may have been pity. "This is not the best part," I said quickly, whirling around away from her. A wall of spite and distaste had come up suddenly when I saw her staring at me with still more pity. I have had enough of pity; I needed more than that simple sadness, more than she was offering at that moment.

I beckoned her closer with an elegant flick of my wrist, and showed her a space that if she crouched, could be slid into. I turned to catch her, and time stopped as she slid down my body, her waist settling into my hands, just as the first of the orchestra members were settling into their positions and began carefully tuning their instruments.

I did not wish to suppurate at the mere touch of her anymore, but rather, I had the irrational desire to shout out to all present that I had touched her, that the angel had let me hold her close, if only for a moment, before she slipped away. In a gesture that mimicked my own familiar movements, she pulled her own cape off with both hands, causing it to flare out behind her.

It was my turn to gasp in awe and delight at the mere sight of her. She wore the dress of sapphire that I had gotten for her, and to say that it fit her like a second skin would be an understatement. I do not know how she managed to breathe, but I did not really give a damn, as the sight of her pert little breasts peeking over the bodice that tapered so incredibly to her waist, her tiny ribs, then flared back out at her hips, had caught me in a moment of sweet, sweet desire.

She smiled shyly, then moved as if to place her cape back over her, but I withheld her with one hand, my mouth still agape. She turned her back to me, and I wished to bury my hands into the waterfall of hair that spilled down her back, so long, nearly touching the bustling in her skirts.

The dust that floated in the air, illuminated by the lights below us, had turned her into an apparition of heavenly proportions. If she had sprouted downy wings and wrapped herself in them, I could not have been taken more aback.

I shook myself visibly, suppressing a shiver that started at the base of my spine and rolled upwards. Time began again, slowly at first, then speeding as she turned to face me again, her lips playing about a girlish grin.

I offered her my hand, and she reached out to touch me, hesitated, then placed her fingers in mine, her eyes closing when she touched my bitter flesh. She had grown accustomed to the leather gloves that I wore to spare her, and I had forgotten that I had slipped them off.

I groaned in disgust at my own vile being, and carefully helped Christine to the floor of the small square room that we hid in. She spared me a glance full of suspicion as I lowered myself next to her, then pointed to the flooring above us.

"Keep your eyes above us, sweeting, for the true beauty of it all is up there," I murmured, pointing with a bony finger.

The noise below us gradually swelled as the audience slowly filed in, dressed in diamonds and satin, clutching their opera glasses in anticipation. The house lights fell suddenly, pitching us into darkness, and I could hear Christine stifle a scream. She clutched my sleeve tightly, frightened.

The boards above us came alive with a dazzling array of colors as the stage lights reflected off the crystal of the chandelier, changing with the gels and moving scenery. The opera was irrelevant, the orchestra and the voices blending together in a symphony of color and sound, mesmerizing both of us. We were caught in a torrent of beauty and tragedy, of light and shadows, neither of us able to speak, but both understanding.

I tore my eyes from the wondrous display above us and turned to gaze at Christine. She was staring raptly at the dancing lights, her eyes full of wonder and delight. I wished to kiss her then, more than at any other time in my life, to press my lips to hers as she molded herself to me.

I found myself frozen by her azure eyes suddenly on mine, and I was afraid that she was clairvoyant, for she wet her lips nervously, and her breasts lifted with every stuttered breath. The surrender in her body, the way that she peered at me from beneath her sooty lashes, oh, God, it was unbearable. I could have dared to make love to her then, there, suspended above the heads of royalty and noblemen, tumbling, lost forever in her ivory skin and honey caresses.

As it was, I could feel everything else falling away, narrowing down to a pinpoint of light that reflected in her pupils.

After an eternity, the lights came back up, and it was done. I caught a lock of her gilded hair, crushed it in my fist, and trailed a finger lazily across her throat and over her shoulder, a shudder passing over her.

I snatched my hand back suddenly, sucking air in, ashamed of my boldness. I flew to my feet, hastily pulling Christine up with me.

We fled down to the area behind the stage, climbing over piles of rope and pieces of scenery as the door shutters and scene shifters scurried around.

"Erik," she hissed, pulling on my arm, resisting. "Erik, wait!"

"We must go," I protested, but she dug her heels in, and I gritted my teeth as she pulled harder still. "What is it? What is wrong?"

"Do not be afraid, Erik," she said gently.

"I'm not afraid," I snapped. "Don Juan fears nothing!" She stepped back as if she had been slapped.

"I'm afraid, Erik. I'm afraid of the fire that you ignite in my soul, in my blood. I'm terrified of the way that my heart seems as if it will beat right out of my body when you are near to me. I have nightmares of your hands touching me. I'm even more afraid of what you will do to me mentally, of how you will ravage my sanity and my spirit. I'm petrified of the idea that if I do give in to you, I shall never be able to stop!"

"I am terribly contrite," I said lowly. "You must surely understand that I cannot help myself."

"Be silent, Erik, my Angel of Music, for I am going to die if you do not touch me," she said breathlessly, pressing hard into me, her head falling back.

"Christine," I murmur as I lower my head, my mind falling blank as I reached to sample her divine lips, and—

"Do not worry, mademoiselle! I shall keep this beast from ravaging you!" a voice cried from behind her, and she whipped her head around as I pulled her into my cloak, protective.

I snarled something unintelligible, pulling Christine with me behind a piece of scenery. New voices joined in the search, and everyone seemed to be running, trying desperately to find us.

"It is the ghost! He has taken another victim!"

"Summon the gendarme at once!"

"No, you fools, let us be off at once and find some iron to touch so that we may be protected against him!"

They at once all ran off to find some charm or another, but a more pragmatic group kept after us, rounding the corner behind the set in time to see me land a forceful kick to a release, and the ropes jerked upward and began to whine from the speed at which they wound over the pulleys. The small plank of wood that we were standing on rose at a shocking speed, and I held her close to me, one arm locked around her waist, the other steadying us against the rope.

Christine's eyes never left mine as we hurtled through the air, everything speeding by in a blur. She appeared dazed, under some hypnotic spell, as if…

As if I had sung her into a stupor.

But I had not uttered a single note. What strange new behavior was this? Did she truly…desire me such that she was willing to abandon all concept of reality? Was she truly so responsive to my touch, my presence?

It did not matter, for we fled with all haste through and around the place that had once been the scene of so much tragedy and loss. Still, we were pursued, relentlessly, the mob certain that I had abducted yet another young beauty to sacrifice to my desire for blood.

"Erik, we have to go back to the lake," Christine said haltingly.

"I do not wish to cause you any sorrow, or grief," I said as I pulled her with me through a dark hall. "Besides, I walled many entrances in the hopes of being left alone."

"And the mirror? Is that passage still open?" she said after a moment. I regarded her quietly, my mind galloping around without going anywhere.

"Yes, it is. I could not…I could not pretend as if you did not exist. I had to have something of you left, something more than a few letters and a shoe buckle."

So it was that we dashed into the dressing room that was once hers, she frantically locking the door as I searched for the spring that had grown creaky with age. We fell into the passage together, she stumbling over her long dress, me trying desperately to both catch her and to keep my own legs moving.

I maneuvered her carefully into a slight depression in the wall, and stood before her, looming large, spreading my cloak so that we were concealed in shadows. My sharp ears pricked at the sound of breaking glass, and I braced my arms against the tunnel so that I would not crush her if I was shoved against in their hurry.

They came by in a single body, brushing past me without ever realizing that they had overlooked the very thing that they pursued. All the while they trampled by, Christine had her face upturned, and she snaked her hands into my cloak so that they pressed hotly to my back, distracting.

Her body molded to mine, one of her legs coming to rest between mine. I enfolded her in my heavy cloak so that we were surrounded by shadows, my large frame pinning her to the wall. My hands fit around her waist, digging in slightly to her ribcage, but she did not cry out.

I could feel myself falling forward into the oceans of her eyes, falling, lost, and I did not try to find myself. I abandoned all thought of sanity and reason, and before my mind came back to me, I pressed my lips roughly to hers.

Oh! God in Heaven! Every great and tragic thing that my soul had ever been marred by was suddenly made fallow and irrelevant, banished with the taste of the one that I worshipped. Her tears fell into mine and mingled on our lips, making the passion taste bitter and obscene.

All too swiftly, she had pulled away slightly, her lips nearly brushing mine, such that I have, and a strange mix of concern and adoration shown in her eyes.

"We must go," I said softly, allowing my hand to reach up and push an errant curl behind her ear.

"No, Erik, do not make me leave the dream yet," she murmured as she placed her forehead on my shoulder. "I do not care for my reality anymore, and you make it so easy to escape from the true colors of the world. It is nothing but fantasies and altered consciousness here; I can hide in the past, let it cover me, and drown in the memories."

"Not all memories found here are pleasant, my sweet one. Some of them weep of pain and discord—you ran from this place for a reason, and it will not be so easy to forget."

"Some pain is worth enduring, Erik," she said as she took my by the crook of my elbow and we took our solitary way. "The fear, the torment, the anguish…It is like a dream now and somehow irrelevant. I have tasted true pain," she whispered. She turned her eyes to me, and I could deny her nothing for allowing me to place my lips on hers, to feel how tender her heart was once more.

"What would you ask of me?"

"Take me to your house by the lake," she said after a moment's pause. "I wish to see where it happened, all of it."

* * *

Christine said little, but her eyes were brimming with tears as she ran a hand over the remnants of my great organ, the pipes now toppled carelessly, the keys askew. She picked her feet carefully over bits and pieces of furniture, crunching over glass and brittle paper. She bent to retrieve a sheet, softly blowing the dust from it.

"Oh, Erik," she murmured. "They destroyed it all, didn't they? Your organ, your home…even your Don Juan."

"Yes, they did. What was left, I removed to your home."

A light flickered in her eyes, a realization coming to light. "You didn't come there merely to save me from poverty, did you? You came because you had nowhere else to go."

I clenched my jaw reflexively, angry at her perceptiveness, and at her pity, that damnable pity, that shown about her face. Something cold fell over my heart again, over any amiable feelings that had been playing about in the bowels of my body.

"This is really where it happened, isn't it Erik? There, in the dark halls, here on the shore of the lake where I was undone by music and candlelight? It seems so strangely long ago, like a nightmare that has been long forgotten. This is the place that gave me my husband, and my greatest torment, and my greatest triumph. I learned of truly beautiful beings, and that there is a Hell on Earth." She reached for me, tentative, frightened. I bowed my head, turned my face from her.

"Christine—"

"Erik," she said in tones of rich mahogany and deep despair. Her fingertips grazed my jaw, then ventured upward to touch my cheek, my hairline. My eyes burned as I twisted them shut, not breathing, not even thinking. She placed her palm flat on my face, then reached beneath my chin with her other hand, gently pulling me toward her.

"It is fine, Erik," she said softly, and I sank to my knees in quiet gratitude at her gentle hands. The tears flowed from behind my mask, marring my vision. I leaned my head against her abdomen, holding tightly to her as I was drowning and did not know if I could be saved.

She was touching my mask then, drawing her fingers back, afraid that I would be angry. She resumed her exploration after she felt my body go dreadfully still, humming slightly as I sighed.

"Turn your eyes to me Erik," she commanded, and I obeyed, staring up at this deity that was barely illuminated by scattered candlelight. Her lips lifted into a pretty smile, and I knew that she had forgiven me. "I do not hate you, my angel of shadows; I never have. I have been frightened of you, and frightened for you, but never did I hate you. You are the one who gave me my husband, whether you would care to know that truth or not, but it is what happened. If not for you, Raoul and I may never have had a chance at happiness, however brief it was."

"Let me have a chance to make you happy once more," I pleaded. "Let me give to you something of the joy that you felt. You may never be able to love me as you did him, but I can at least make you content."

"Will that be enough for us? Will it be enough for you to know that my first thought upon waking will always be of Raoul?"

"Only if thoughts of the ghost who has loved you for all time escort you into your dreams," I said, rising, taking her by her hands.

"Take me home now, Erik," she sighed.

* * *

"When Raoul and I would be sitting like this, across from each other in the carriage, there would be moments, brief lapses in my memory where all I could see of him were bright yellow eyes that burned into mine. Other times it would be your voice I would hear, instead of his, telling me to sing, to sing and to bare my soul for all to see. He was so very patient with me," she continued, her gaze never leaving the rolling hills that sped by, "he knew that I was troubled by you, but he did not know how or why." She turned to spare me a glance full of embarrassment and shame. "It was because you had awakened some deep part of my soul that I had never felt before. You caused my heart to ache in ways that I had never dreamed existed."

The sound of my own heart beating began to fill my ears, the blood rushing past in a deafening roar. The whole world seemed damp with longing, colored in reds and oranges. I had never desired someone the way that I needed her, but it was more than simple lust. It was a passion for everything that she was, a primal desire to know every secret of her mind and body, to cradle her heart gently next to mine.

"Before I found you, I was so immensely cold," I murmured, filling the air with my words, my voice. "Everything was frozen, within and without my body, my mind. All seemed to be black and white, with no passion or color. I heard your voice, and it was like coming to life for the first time. I had learned how to enjoy life until…until you left. I was so alone, so terribly alone in the world. Now I am so ungodly warm that I do not know how I am still alive without turning into an ember before your eyes."

"You were always warm to me," she said, and then she was falling into my arms, filling my senses with all that was Christine.

"Touch me again, Christine. Touch me, and I shall show you true happiness!" She pressed her face to mine, her lips moving carefully across my skin, until she pulled away shame-faced and crying.

"I do not know why I feel as if I am betraying Raoul, or some small part of my own self, but I do. I need you, but I do not want you," she wept, fleeing from the carriage as soon as it had jerked to a stop.

I followed after her in movements made of mercury, certain that I would either kill her, or rend her mindless with my longing. I did not care which as I brushed past Sophie, my feet stamping across the wood of the stairs. I had become a panther again, some predatory animal that cared only for satisfying its most base needs. It was all to easy to envision Christine as a frightened deer before me, bleeding her last drops of blood, my name on her lips. She would be just as beautiful if she was dead, I was certain of it. Then we could be interred together, the living dead and the dead that were too gorgeous to truly die.

I placed a well-aimed kick just above the bolt and knob of the door, and it popped open easily on its hinges, slamming into the wall behind it. Christine gave a small yelp of fear, then appeared to be debating about fleeing or simply fainting. I leapt to her, grasping her tiny ribs and shoving her roughly to the wall behind the bed. Her head cracked painfully, and she blinked for a while, dazed. When she came to her senses, I was inches from her face, sweating, panting, furious.

"Do not toy with me, you little minx!" I shouted, causing her to flinch and whimper. "I have waited an eternity for someone to touch me, to give me hope of love, and now for the second time you have fled from me when I have dared to care for you! No more!" I shook her slightly, and she began to writhe, trying desperately to break my iron grasp.

"Erik, I cannot breathe!" she gasped, her mouth open wide with panic, her perfect white teeth flashing.

"And you believe that I can? I cannot breathe for wanting you! I have given you all that I am, do you not see that? You unhappy wench, what more could you ask of me? All that I desire is to be your faithful slave in return for your cruel attempts at kindness!"

"Erik! Please!"

"Be still, and do not pull against me or I will tighten my hold on you until you break in half!" She began to beat on my chest, her small fists pounding out a staccato rhythm. I sudden pain in my shin told me that she had resorted to kicking, but my mind was disconnected from my body, watching everything is if I were a spectator.

I forced my lips onto hers brutally, and her body immediately molded to mine as I forced a leg between hers. She tore her mouth away, sucking in air and trying desperately to lean into me again. I buried my hands in her curls, pulling the pins out as she wriggled against me, tearing a snarl from me. Her hair cascaded free, falling over her shoulders as I pressed her face to me again, panting and blowing past her ear, showering her with rough kisses that prickled her skin. She nipped my ear, and everything came rushing back in a flood of desire and want, blind need enveloping me as everything in my body stiffened like a coiled spring.

I ripped at her dress as she tried desperately to cover herself, but my nimble fingers were quicker than she was, and with a last tearing effort, she was free of the dress, standing before me in a corset and shift. She shivered in the cold air, and I pulled her close again as she folded into the creases of my cloak.

Her mouth was on mine in an instant, her lips moving daintily against my clumsy ones, obscenely shoving against me. I ground my teeth together and pinned her hips firmly against mine, still irate, and considered raking my hands across her skin until she bled, but her own fluttering caresses stilled my lust for blood for a moment, then it came flooding back violently, filling my ears and eyes with visions of death and vermilion.

Her breasts were damp with sweat that sprang up all over her, making her face look like it was wet with dew. She heaved and pitched against me, and another groan escaped me, teasing, pulling, insistent. I reached to her back and pulled roughly on the laces of her corset, wrenching it free and tearing her shift off of her, the delicate fabric ripping easily.

The sight of her alabaster flesh bared before me sent me reeling. I pulled her into my chest, but began trembling, so I pushed her away, and told her to stand in the candlelight.

"Why?" she asked, shy, nervous now that she had nothing to hide behind.

"Because I wish to memorize the different hues of your skin, so that I may always remember how the shadows fell across your body."

She obeyed timidly, her eyes downcast, her chin at her chest. I stood and sweated and marveled at the wondrous thing that had been wrought when she was created. She lifted a hand to her neck, attempting to cover herself, and I could see that she shed silent tears. I watched as one fell onto her neck and traced a river over her sternum.

"Why are you weeping, oh saccharine being? One this exquisite should not cry bitter tears," I said, hurling the words forward like an insult.

"Raoul never made me feel so…so naked," she whispered. "I feel like I am naked to my soul."

"Then you know how I have felt every agonizing moment that I have been in your presence," I said as I pulled her to me again. "I have laid everything bare out for you to see from the moment that I knew that I loved you, you damnable creature."

Silence passed between us, and I was afraid that she would turn from me, but no, she was reaching up to pull on my cravat, fumbling with the knot. I waited patiently while she yanked it off, then pushed my cloak off, and threw my hat into the shadows.

I kissed her again, chastely, sweet, like a virgin kissing another, and she was so still, as if she were listening with her entire body. A flush crept over her body, indicating her embarrassment, but I would not let her go. I dipped my head down to sample the warm flesh of her neck, to press kisses along her jugular and then one just below and behind her ear. I was rewarded with a quiet hum of pleasure, and I nicked my teeth across her, gooseflesh rising on her skin.

"Let me…" she said, then began to quietly unbutton my waistcoat, my vest, my shirt. She pushed them one at a time down over my arms, her fingers light over me. She gasped at the sight of my torso crisscrossed by scars, and she traced a couple of them that ran over my chest and into my ribs.

"Oh, Erik. What happened?" I lifted one shoulder in a careless gesture, abruptly feeling vulnerable and a bit like a child.

"Too many things that are far too gruesome for a lady's ears." She nestled into me again, her breasts pushing firmly against me, causing me great physical discomfort. "I do believe that if you do that again, I shall lose any restraint that I still have." She smiled a bit coyly and then she was tugging at the tops of my trousers, unsure and shy. Her hand that was free traveled the length of my torso, pausing to follow the lines of my body. She reached my leg, then paused as she felt the hardness there, her fingers drawing back like startled fawns.

I wished to see more of her, all of her, to taste the salt of her skin, so I turned her abruptly, her back now against my chest. I flicked a finger over her shoulder blade, down her spine, causing her to shiver and sigh. I sampled her flesh with my tongue, it lapping out against the back of her neck, and she tasted warm and like lavender. My arms encircled her and my palms pressed flat against her abdomen, then slid them upward, stopping when they reached the heated flesh of her breasts. I cupped her carefully, testing, curious. When I passed a thumb over a pink nipple, she moaned quietly and tossed her head back into me. I repeated the motion with both hands, creating small, slow circles.

When her knees wobbled a bit, I caught her around the waist, and lifted her carefully so that she stared up at me for a brief moment as everything turned to honey and was syrupy sweet. Nothing else could have mattered for those seconds of time that turned to days, years, centuries in the blink of an eye.

I unceremoniously laid her on the bed, then knelt before her, curiosity staying my hands on my trousers. I followed the bones of her hips that flowed into her legs with a single finger, then slid them over to gently touch her sex. Her eyes flew open when the back of my hand brushed the small fold of skin that was nestled at the top. I touched her again, letting my fingers walk over her, gently probing, stroking, caressing. She pushed the damp curls into the palm of my hand, and her hips began to rock very gently, almost invisibly.

"Oh, Erik, what are you doing?" she sighed.

"Do you wish for me to stop?"

"No," she whispered, "Don't stop. I can feel it all the way in the palms of my hands and the bottoms of my feet." Her answer pleased me, and I quietly dispensed with my pants while she was distracted by the sensations coursing through her body.

Quite suddenly I was leaning over her, her hands planted firmly on my chest, her mouth panting out warm breaths across my face.

"I do hope that you are very certain of how much I would enjoy having you even as a dead wife."

"I am quite certain, and I do not give a damn anymore. I am tired of trying so desperately to be the proper wilting willow of a lady, and I'm finished with it. I have wanted you for so long, I do not even believe that this is not a dream. I do not care if I die from your kisses, or from the way you move with me, but if you do not do either soon, I shall kill you myself."

"You dreamed of me?" I inquired with narrowed eyes, concentrating to see if she was jesting.

"Of course. Your voice used to curl around me and make my skin hum, like it is now, and I would wonder what sort of man possessed that sort of power. Then you were behind the mirror, filling the doorway, and you could have had me then and there. It was all so heady, so delirious, that all I could see were your burning eyes, your large frame, your find hands… How I used to dream of you!"

"Christine," I grated, "I have never needed anyone like I have needed you. My soul cannot bear to be without you for a moment longer. Tell me, did it make you sweat to think of me? Did it cause you to come over warm and feverish? Did you want Erik's cold hands running over you, teasing you like this?" I placed my palms over her breasts again, the nipples erect and pushing into my hands.

"Oh!" she cried. She lifted her hips to mine, and I groaned again, pushing her legs apart further with my knees and thrusting into her with one graceful movement. She cried out a bit, and I was both electrified and terrified that I had hurt her in my enthusiasm, but she was digging her fingers into my back, gasping for breath and urging me on with tiny little thrusts of her own.

"Did you want Erik to take you like this?" I grasped her wrists and slammed them to the pillow under her head, pressing downward so that her body arched upward toward me, tight as a bowstring, then began to thrust again, taking her in great, all-encompassing movements. "Come now, darling, surely you must be a little terrified; after all, I have wanted to feel your blood running over my hands, to bury my mouth in some gaping wound and to fill my mouth with the life flowing through you!"

She struggled against me a bit, which only increased my fervor until I felt that I would go mad with need. I bit her viciously on her neck, her collarbone, then released her hands so that I could grip her hips and hold her tightly against me while I thrusted into her as if I were a stallion on a mare in heat. She cried out again when I ground my fingers into her bones hard enough to feel them grinding, but she did not ask me to stop; nay, I say she fairly wrapped her legs about my waist and held me prisoner.

"Oh, God! Erik," she moaned, her pretty voice washing over me. I snarled at her to sing, to sing for me, and she obeyed, letting her voice rise in a passionate crescendo. I buried my face into the crook of her neck as I felt her come undone, her orgasm wracking her body.

"How I love you! How I've always loved you," I murmured into her skin as I felt myself tumbling over a waterfall of skin and blood and lust. I fell into her, and all was still.


	23. Chapter 23

I was chased from sleep early by lingering nightmares about a statue of glass that wept blood, and cursed my name. I awoke confused, disoriented; the sun's rays were peeking through the curtains, blinding my eyes. I could not remember the last time that I had slept from dark 'til light.

I had a momentary flash of peace that radiated through my bones, but it quickly turned to sick dread as I beheld the battered body next to mine. I clutched my chest, lest my heart leap forth and weep a trail of blood for the misery I had created.

My mind became lost to me then, and I ceased to exist as I had before. My vision narrowed to a darkened tunnel, as if everything were very, very far from me. I watched dispassionately as I rose, and fled to the dark and the shadows. Rage became the master of my body, and there was the sound of splintering wood and shattering glass all about, all the while reams of paper with notes on them fell like snow.

My own blood began to flow, gathering on the floor in a river that carried me into a void that had no end, no beginning, and the Gates of Hell creaked and groaned as they swung open. Countless pairs of hands reached up to pull me down, to yank and groan and writhe as I sank to their depths, all the countless, nameless victims of me and my devil's hands.

Someone called me by name, a voice I felt that I should recognize, but all reason had been abandoned, lest I be forced to confront the unequivocal guilt.

I had soiled the angel, torn and battered, and I began to tear at my own flesh, creating tracks across my already deformed being. I had traded my own lust and desire, a bit of satisfactory sin, for an eternity full of burning and madness.

Bought and sold, traded and told.

Pain radiated outward from the back of my skull, and my hands flew up to push my assailant off, but they would not be swayed, and the faceless person opened their mouth and poured out oceans of water onto my face.

"Erik!" they shouted, again and again, heedless of my flailing arms. "Erik, you must go! Quickly!"

Go? I have already gone; I was gone long ago, anchored to mortality only by the love of a seraph.

Another sharp crack to my head, and I was forced to reality, taking quick stock of my body. Small hands were wrapped about my neck, lifting my head and slamming it to the floor. Dark eyes and hair fell into my face, while a knee pressed rudely into my gut.

"Please, Erik!" Sophie.

"Where? Why do you hit me so hard, mother? I have already promised to go," I pouted, reality blending into memories that overlapped in indistinguishable layers.

"No, Erik! Please, get up! You must go after her!"

"I already have; I chased her over the edge, and now she has fallen." A vision of Christine, her long hair flying out behind her, long gown flying up over her delicate ankles, a revelation of gold and white, her legs flashing as she ran, ran to…Where? Something roared in the distance, ruthless, persistent. She leaped from a sandy cliff where her feet left a perfect trail into a gray and pounding ocean, slipping silently beneath the surface, her hair and dress becoming one as they swirled and twisted, her gentle fingers beckoning to me…

"Christine!" I shouted, bolting upright, catching Sophie on the forehead with mine.

"She has left, monsieur, early this morning, and the stable boy has not been able to find any sign of her, nor the carriage man!"

She was on the verge of hysterics, wringing her hands and biting her lips. Call down to the mews, and have my horse waiting for me."

"Monsieur, wait," Sophie said, holding something to me, her eyes lowered. I swiftly pressed my mask to my face, and flew to the stables.

* * *

Spring was roaring in on violent winds and distempered tempests that whipped the gray sea into a frenzy. The waves pounded into the sandy beach mercilessly, lifting high and crashing down with enough force to render broken bones.

Exodus cared not for the looks of the frantic ocean, but he was brave, and bold, and he hesitated only a moment when I pressed my heels to his sides. He lifted his feet high in the sand, snorting and prancing sideways a bit, but I did not care, as I was searching for a sign, anything, but it was as if she had disappeared. I urged him into a gallop that swallowed up meters of sand in each stride, his mane brushing my face as I leaned over his shoulders.

All the while my eyes scanned the wet sand, I attempted to lay my sins out before me, but they swiftly numbered too many, and I was overwhelmed. If I were to throw myself into the ocean, none would care. If I were to simply swim out to sea and disappear, the world would not mourn my passing.

What a treacherous creature I was. What a miserable, tormented spawn of some unknown demon. I had no pride left, no dignity, and I deserved to die as such. Perhaps I would, later, I would bleed my aching heart out for Christine, so that she may take it apart as she saw fit.

Christine.

Christine.

_Christine_.

Perhaps I had been wrong, and now she simply was caught in the woods, faded and transformed into a woodland nymph, peeking from between the trees with laughing eyes, but then the winds shifted, blowing west instead of east for a moment, and something caught in the wind fluttered upward for a moment, enough to lift it into my vision. White and gold mingled into a single being, a lone figure who pressed into the sea, reeling slightly from the immense waves.

Her face bore no expression, no lift or tilt of the lips, nothing to make it appear alive or animated. She focused only on the distant horizon, unblinking, unfazed as the water lapped at her ankles icily. Another moment, and her knees were submerged, and she nearly lost her footing.

I said nothing, but slid off Exodus and thumped a bit unsteadily to the shoreline, and called to her, but she either did not hear me, or she did not care. I wondered, briefly, if Nacken was out in the waves, calling to her and playing his violin. I steeled myself as best I could, and with gritted teeth, followed her into the sea.

The cold was shocking, debilitating, but I concentrated on pulling in the salty air, forcing my lungs to continue working, but it was like being pricked and stabbed a thousand times over, and I considered if this was just another leg on the journey through Hades.

Christine cried out when I grabbed her wrist, and at first, I believed it to be shock, or perhaps even dismay, but as I stumbled from the gut-wrenching cold, I beheld what a miserable state she was in. Dark rings framed her eyes, sunken, desperate eyes, and bruises laced around her wrists like bracelets. Her lips were swollen and red, standing out unnaturally from her sickly pallid skin.

I cursed myself more as I clumsily placed her on the saddle in front of me, my cloak wrapped tightly about her, and fumbled for the reins. I cursed my face, my ugliness, my lust, my genius, my entire existence. I was overwhelmed by the sheer enormity of my wrong-doing, and had it not been for the drive to save Christine, I'd have happily plunged into the gray sea myself.

As it were, Christine's head lopped about senselessly, her mouth uttering tiny noises and phrases that held no meaning, random thoughts about her home in Sweden, her friends at the opera, a button that she had lost off a favorite dress.

"Oh," she said finally, her eyes resting on me. "It's all so very silly..."

"What on earth are you doing here? Why have you--"

"I just wanted to see the waves," she whispered, her eyes rolling back into her head. "I just wanted to feel Raoul again. That silly boy, did you know he went after my scarf?"

I hung my head, and allowed myself to pull her tighter against me. "Hold tightly, my dear. I shall bear you home with all haste!"

* * *

She called for Raoul, over and over, told him to fly far, far away from the torture chamber, told her to stop stealing kisses in darkened corners, and finally, she called for him to come away from the sea, it was only a scarf, after all.

My ears wept to hear her words tumbling out so carelessly, like discarded pages of a book. She had no concept of time, or space, for she did not recognize her own home, or that something was horribly wrong.

The carriage stood waiting in the yard, harnessed with four horses, and so was the phaeton, Raoul's own mount in the pulls, a fine bay steed that was intelligent as he was handsome. Sophie cried out when she saw her mistress laying across the great black neck, muttering and twitching, her feet covered with cuts and blisters from walking so far in the sand with no coverings.

She carefully helped her limp into the phaeton, where she laid her across the bench and wrapped her in many blankets. Sophie turned her dark eyes to mine for a fleeting moment, speaking in biting tones that were accusing and apathetic.

"They are coming, monsieur, coming for my mistress and for you," she said, still bustling about. "They mean to hang either one or both of you, I do not know, but they have had enough of the ghost who has plagued their peaceful town. They blame you for all sorts of wrong-doings, and I do not find them without some merit. We must hurry."

"Go, go ahead. Head to the south until sunset. If I have not joined you by then, I shall not be coming." Sophie nodded her head gravely, but Christine sat up suddenly, her eyes clouded and unseeing, her voice trembling as she poured out looks of pity and despair.

"Is it so easy for you to leave me, Erik? Is it so terribly simple to abandon us when I need you?"

"You do not need me, darling one," I said, and longed to run my hand just once more over the hollows in her cheek, her pretty hair.

"We must go," Sophie said with finality, turning only once to look at me as she slapped the reins against the horse's rump. They all rumbled away, but the storm had already gathered on the horizon, and I was prepared to stay, to either die in it, or to be baptized by fire.


	24. Chapter 24

**AN: And now, we have come to the end. Thank you for coming on this short and angsty journey with me. Please stay on the lookout for more written goodies coming your way soon!**

They were scared.

They were frightened, nervous, nervous that the ghost may reach forth and curse their tongues, afraid that he was a mortal man that would happily bathe in their death. Nevertheless, they marched on, delayed only for a moment at the iron gate that had been shut against them.

I was the master again, the trap-door lover, the phantom, the shade. I was bloody Don Juan, prepared to turn his lust into the cold of a murderer. But perhaps murder is not the right word; butcher would have been more accurate.

Yet, as I raised my arm high, preparing to begin the blood bath, Christine's eyes floated before me, her down turned face shy and smiling. I was suddenly without hate, or even anger, and found that the desire to maim and kill was ebbing away, gently, like the tide.

I was the ghost, but also I was the Phoenix.

* * *

There was nothing for them to hide behind when the house blazed up suddenly, so many flinched backward from the searing heat. Their little huddle quickly turned into a mass of chaos as I appeared from within the blaze, springing forward on a horse carved out of the night sky, smoke and my cloak mingling into the hide of Exodus. My eyes smoldered bright as the fire behind me, my Death's head naked in the orange light, sitting upright and tall, glaring down at them from high above their heads.

They cried out and cowered as Exodus lifted into the air, prancing on his back legs as he raised himself nearly upright, his fore hooves catching those who were bold enough to rush forward, and had paused at the sight of my mad beast snorting and pawing the air. I named all the stars, and numbered them with my gratitude at his superb sense of balance.

Nearly all of them broke and ran after that, and those that remained, I did not soil my conscience with their blood, as they raised simple weapons to me, and I dispatched them with broken necks and strangled windpipes.

Sunset was coming.

I turned, and we fled into the darkening sky, trailing the cries of women and children who crossed themselves at the sight of Death boldly galloping through the countryside.

* * *

Christine did not lift her eyes at my approach, although Sophie looked mildly grateful. In truth, Christine's eyes had not stopped raining sad and angry tears, but I believed them to be derived from the loss of her gentle mare that she had loosed in her madness.

"Where to, milady?"

"To the sun," she said wistfully. "I am so tired of being cold at all hours of the day. I wish for the sun to warm my bones and to grant me a smile." I bowed my head in acquiesce. I knew where to take her, and, ultimately, to leave her. I had made up my mind--I should spare her my poison.

We traveled into the night, and through the day, one on top of the other until they seemed without end and beginning. We were all weary and the horses were footsore from the grueling distance, but they obediently pressed on.

Christine's bruises healed nicely with compress made of comfrey and cumin from the pouch of herbs that I had secured from the house just before I had set it ablaze. It came to be that she was well enough to complain of sitting for hours on end without feeling the French wind on her face, so she took my place on Exodus, and I led her over the hills and through the valleys. Exodus, for his part, took great care with the lady, lifting his hooves carefully and arching his great neck.

It was so for many, many weeks.

* * *

"Go now, Sophie, and find her a house by the sea, with great open windows that she can lean from and smell the salt of the green water," I said lowly, extracting a diamond as big as my thumb from the only other parcel that I carried out of France with me. Sophie gasped at the jewel, her eyes wide, but she closed it in her fist, and departed from me.

I gave Christine no farewell, as there was none to give. I simply watched her breathe for a moment, and allowed myself to remember one night, so long ago, when we had shared breath and sweated each other's sweat.

I turned from her, and began my lonely journey into the mountains nearby.

* * *

Christine flourished in La Costa del Sol, The Coast of the Sun. She seemed to bloom again into all that she once was in the warm Spanish sun. Her hair shone as brightly as her eyes, and she laughed easily. Only every once in a while would she turn away and grow saddened, whenever she saw the sea, or if she turned her eyes to the direction that I had departed in. I did not dare to hope.

I stayed near her; where else had I to go? But I never showed myself, not even once, but allowed my voice to ring around the hills and capped mountains on full-moon nights, and once, her voice joined mine in glorious harmonies that made children burst into tears, and grown men rub their eyes with damp fists, and it was better than any marriage vow.

I had a peculiar sense of freedom, for no one knew where I was, and those who caught fleeting glances of me held their tongues. Who would have believed tales of a shadow who wore a mask that lived in the trees?

Sophie noticed Christine's ease, and the blooms on her cheeks, but kept her own counsel. She also did not inform her mistress that she had the knowledge of my general whereabouts, and I am certain that this put Christine more at ease.

I was naturally taken aback when on a night that the moon hid her face, Sophie slowly made her way up the hill to where I could usually be found making faces appear in the stars.

"Erik," she called in the dark, unsure and a bit afraid.

"I am here,"I called, bending my voice around her.

"Christine bids me to find you, and to bring you to her home by the sea."

"Why? What does she say?"

"Only that I am to bring you," Sophie huffed, exasperated. She turned and made her way back down to the village, the smell of the ocean heavy in the air.

* * *

"Christine."

She did not turn from where she held her upper body out of the window, into the night air. "Did you know that sometimes I can feel the spray from the ocean when the tides and the winds are just right?" she said whimsically, and I was fearful that she had not fully, nor would she ever, regained her mental capacities, that I had damaged her beyond repair.

"Why do you summon me from the hills where I have found peace in my solitude?" I snipped, and she did not berate me as I expected. She turned away, resplendent in the muslin clothing that the locals all clad themselves in on hot nights.

"I have no wish to ever see you again, but it is not right to leave everything undone like this. You have a right to be here, as you are the one who purchased this home. As it is, I do not know what I should feel toward you, other than hate. Your voice is still in my hears, in my head, singing songs."

"You have brought me here to tell me this? That you hate me? This, I already know." I turned to leave then, blinded by bright, angry tears that sprang up.

She caught me by my arm then, her eyes filled with anger and loathing, which softened as she took my hand, and turned it carefully. She did not flinch as she placed my palm on the hillock of her womb.

I crumbled into the first tears of pure joy that I shed, tears that she caught in her hands and turned to sapphires, sources of strength and happiness. I cried as the sun turned everything bullion, and did not cease until Christine insisted that she needed to sit.

I do not know what I anticipated, but I thought that surely something would change between us, that somehow she could have found enough pity in her heart to take me as her companion, but she remained silent and resolute, speaking to me only when necessary.

I quietly attended to her every need; indeed, I barely let her feet touch the floor. I made presents of everything that she could possibly desire, from a splendid Andalusian mare to fine local cuisine.

She thanked me all that I did, but her voice never rose or fell with any sort of emotion. She was cold and distant, rousing herself only in the company of Sophie or the local midwife, a jolly woman named Maria.

I hated this chill that gripped Christine's heart, hated it more than when she had openly despised me. At least hate and anger show some semblance of emotion, enough that one is willing to be spiteful to prove a point, or to demonstrate their rightness. The bitterness flowing through her frightened me, for it is when there is nothing left to say that there is nothing there.

When it came to be time for her to deliver, she insisted that I remain by her side throughout the whole of her travail, and this time the midwife smiled at me, curious about the man who wore a mask, but amused that I stood by Christine's side, enduring her iron grasp on my hand.

Christine's bravery unfolded as the hours wore on and found her sweating and cursing at me in French. When I offered up encouragement as another pain lifted her up and wrung her out, she damned me to Hell, and told me to hold my foul tongue. The midwife laughed at this, not understanding the words, but discerning their meaning.

When Christine began to hold her breath, the midwife blew gently into her face, forcing her to inhale, and causing Christine to gasp a bit of laughter herself as she had her blow back into her own face. She told Christine quietly not to push, not to push, all in Spanish which I put into French for Christine's ears, and then she was shouting curses at Maria, and told her that if she did told her not to push one more time, she would put her eyes out. Maria murmured encouragement in her purring tongue, and Christine took comfort and slept for a time.

As the sun began to set again, Christine whimpered and delivered a skinny babe, which promptly began to wail in high, clear notes. I turned my face away, and shed tears both of gratitude and fear, and waited for the gasps and cries of disgust. I did not wish to see this poor child branded in the same way that I had been.

Both women did indeed cry out, and silence encompassed us all as the howling had stopped. I waited, waited for an eternity in which I lived and died a thousand times over while I waited for them to say something, anything.

"Erik, come and see your daughter," Christine finally commanded breathlessly. The midwife smiled at me, her eyes shining a bit.

I leaned over to behold the small newborn, and all the air I had been holding seemed to vanish. Everything seemed to disappear except for a pair of citrine eyes that mirrored my own. Her entire face was dominated by them, open and taking everything in slowly. Every other feature on her face was an exact copy of Christine's, from the straight upturned nose to the dainty lips and high cheekbones. She had a shock of black hair that was still wet and curled to her head.

Christine held her out to me, and before I knew it, she was asking me what I desired to name the small bundle that stretched and yawned in my arms.

"Helina," I said suddenly, and Christine nodded approval. The midwife packed Christine's womb, patted her head and kissed her cheek, then took her leave without ceremony.

I blinked, and Helina was learning to roll over and to hold things in her tight fists, smiling at my mask and waving a bit of staff paper in her hands. I turned away for a moment, and she was crawling over Persian rugs and through arched doorways, pulling on my pant legs and cooing happily at Christine. I paused to breathe, and she was babbling and tottering about in frilly dresses and playfully tugging on the yellow dog, who bore it all without wincing or growling.

Then came the day that she sat on my lap, and placed her hands on the piano, and happily bashed away, singing out random notes with divine precision. I leaned down to smell her ebony hair which grew long and straight down her back, and I felt younger than I truly was as I chased her along the beach and boosted her onto Exodus' back in the forest.

But no amount of happiness can truly turn back time, or even stop it, and so it came to be that one morning I could not rise from my bed from the crushing pain in my chest. Christine came and wept silent tears, and allowed Helina to trace my mask, as she always did, and to press a butterfly's kiss to me forehead. When she was gone, Christine began to speak.

"I hope that you are at peace now, as you are preparing to leave us. I know that you did nothing to intentionally harm me, but you did drive me mad nearly killed me with your voice nonetheless, and I forgive you every horrible misdeed you ever laid upon me.

"I want you to know also that I did not hate you, not truly," she said, beginning to cry with tears that streaked down her face and onto my bed. "I believe that I may have even loved you, in some small way, not as a wife loves a husband, but as a woman loves a man who has given her a daughter. I thank you for that, no matter how terrible I may have made the circumstances out to be, and I thank you for your friendship, for your tutelage, and your love.

"Above all else, I wish to thank you for your music. You gave my life song and sound, filled it with notes that rang out pure and true. Your great works my never reach the grand halls and high places where they should be heard, but your Don Juan, your thousands of other bits and pieces will always live in the hearts of two women who love you.

"Your daughter loves you very much, Erik. You were able to feel newborn flesh, and see a baby's smile, and hear her call you 'Father.'

"There is nothing left to say, and nothing left to do. You gave me the fullness of your heart, which is the finest thing you could have given to any mortal being. Go, now, and be at peace.

"It is enough."

* * *

Once, when Helina was older, she came and sat beside her mother, and asked her why she had not remarried, and Christine sighed and petted her hair, and said that she had been married twice, and that was enough for any lifetime. Helina asked about the two portraits hanging at opposite ends of the study, one of a fair, handsome gentleman in an officer's uniform, and the other of a man who seemed to be made of shadows and wore a white mask with golden eyes that bored into her.

Christine told her the tale, all of it, from the days that she was a sprightly young girl at the opera, right up to the time that she fled France for the warm Spanish sun and she was given a daughter with elegant hands and a hot temper. They both shed tears full of sorrow, and Christine showed her a trunk full of sheets of music, a violin, an opera called Don Juan Triumphant, and a leather sack full of jewels and gold.

Helina wept for her father, and when she bore her own son, she named him Erik and sang lullabies of dark places and love that burned and healed, and thus, I was made immortal.

* * *

Everything was silent as my voice died, echoing around the stone walls deep beneath the ground. Christine, her face young and full of sorrow, had cried the entire time, and now she dissolved into sobs that wracked her as she placed her head on my chest.

Even the Persian's jade eyes shut in untold misery, observing but silent as Christine spent her sadness in shuddering gasps. I reached up to gently touch her hair, to comfort her, and she pulled away, ashamed and still crying. The daroga held her up by an elbow, and she attempted to dry her face, but the weeping was relentless as a river flooded by spring rains. A small noise came from the corridor outside my home, and I knew that Raoul was there too, and this did not anger me, but rather pleased me to know that he had brought her here, to see her safely through the cellars.

"My darling, my sweet Christine," I said, gasping as the pain returned to my chest, squeezing and crushing. "You are kindness, and the sun in the afternoon. You are the stars, and everything that the moon shines on. How I do love you, my fey one."

"Oh, Erik," she said in a tremulous voice. "I would have…You know that, do you not? I would have been kind to you, had things been different," she cried, overtaken by sobs again.

"I know, and bless you for your kindness that you have already given me. You have already saved me. It was enough for me to dream, and for you to share in my story. Go to your boy, Christine, go and hold him dearly, for he loves you just as I do. Your love for each other is the pure goodness of a summer rain, and that is truly a blessing. Live the life that I wanted for us. He may have you for your mortal time on Earth, but Erik waits for you in immortality, for our souls are intertwined and can never be rent asunder."

I shifted my gaze to the daroga, my dear friend, and found that I had nothing to say, as I had said it all on one rainy afternoon in his home. He bowed low, his fingers spread wide, giving me honor that I did not deserve.

"Take heart, Christine. Give me my cloak, and I shall perform one last trick for you." Christine handed me the dark garment, kissing it and burying her nose in the folds for a brief moment before passing it on.

"Take a piece of my heart with you, and I shall keep your song in my head forever," she whispered into my ear, the scent of her hair lingering even as she pulled away.

Watch closely, I wanted to say, but found that I could not speak. I lifted its blackness over me, and then I fell backward, leaving nothing but a shadow, a memory, and my mask, perched on the seat of my throne. Christine pulled the cloak off, and began to keen sharply as she lifted the mask and held it to her heart.

Her voice transformed then, metamorphosing from a high-pitched death wail to the silvery voice of the moon, pure and radiant, and her song ushered me forward as I tumbled and tumbled, head over heels into a void made of stars and promises, her song wrapping about me in golden threads that neither broke nor hindered me. I tumbled, and I waited for my darling, my angel to come forth and to catch me with her wings spread wide, and we would journey onward together, never apart, never together, but perfect celestial beings who were joined for all time with the breath of a song. The song that I held in my heart was neither daring, nor sinful, nor dangerous, nor ominous; it was pure joy and sorrow, touched with the blue of winter. It was a fitting requiem for one who mastered the ability of making the angels weep bitter tears.

I tumbled, I fell. How I fell for that golden angel, the perfect heartbreak, the perfect measure of tragedy and despair that was harmonious love.

I am still tumbling, forgotten beneath the ground, lost beneath the beautiful palace for music above me, and truly, I could ask for no better tomb.

I am filled with anticipation, for I know that she is coming. I can still feel her hands on my face, and her lips on mine.

And I shiver.

_Fin_


End file.
